Batman Silent Hill: Shadow In The Mist
by darkknight uk
Summary: A seemingly unrelated murders in Gotham City. A string of clues that lead to a quiet little resort town. To solve the mystery The Batman must face his worst nightmare in the town called Silent Hill
1. Prologue

BATMAN / SILENT HILL

A Shadow In The Mist

A Fan Fiction

By

Dan Laurikietis

PROLOGUE

Greg Adams was a good kid. He went to church, never swore out loud, help doors open for people walking behind him and always went out of his way to help friends, family and strangers alike. So when he saw the blood drenched stranger staggering awkwardly toward him on that rainy April night in Gotham his first and only impulse was to rush over to help him.

He had been on a date. At least, he thought it would be a date. Until he saw a tear roll down Vikki's cheek and into her chocolate malt. That was when she had broken down and told him, between sobs, that her family was moving back to Bludhaven. She had only been in Gotham a year. Her dad owned a convenience store. The poor guy had had to install so much hi-tech security equipment in the light of the spate of robbery and petty crime over the holiday season it had damn near bankrupted him. The store wasn't pulling in nearly as much as it cost to run, partly because of the recession but mostly because people were too afraid to leave their apartments to go to the shops anymore. It was bad enough during the day but at night- forget about it!

Greg was only 16 but he had lived in Gotham all his life. He loved every brick in the neo-gothic architecture. He loved every demonic gargoyle that looked out from the rooftops over the city like a twisted guardian angel. He loved the monolithic clock tower, the seemingly endless spire of the cathedral, the miraculous engineering of the massive Kane Memorial Bridge. He was born in Gotham and he would die in Gotham. But even he had to admit things were getting worse. Good people, desperate people were even turning to the mob for guns just so that they could go outside without fearing for their lives. Vikki's dad was sick of it and he had decided to cut his losses. He had a teenage daughter almost ready to graduate from high school, they needed to move somewhere he could give her the support she deserved.

And so it was that they walked side by side in total silence through the grimy streets of the financial district. When the heavens opened and the rain tumbled heavily down they had rushed into the spacious archway of the first national bank and collapsed, sobbing, into each other's arms. That was when he told her that he would always be there for her no matter what and that their love could not be broken by a two-hour drive. Tearfully he promised to visit her every chance he got and as the sky darkened and the lightning flashed and the rain pummelled the trash strewn sidewalk a strange euphoric sense of calm swept over them and they realised that as long as they loved each other then nothing could keep them apart.

It was while they were locked in their tearful embrace, waiting for the fury of the storm to subside that Greg noticed the strange man. He caught the peculiar gait, the shambling walk, the jerky, spasmodic movements of his limbs out of the corner of his eye. On further inspection he noticed the blood, spattered on the strange man's dark trench coat, dried blood caked on his face, in his hair, streaked by the persistence of the rain.

Gently he pushed Vikki aside;

"Wait here. I think that guy might be hurt!"

By the time the penny dropped it was too late. The news reports he only half paid attention to had announced that an unknown killer was operating in Gotham. The killer had been active in the last forty eight hours and while there seemed to be no discernable pattern the victims had all been couples. Couples.

Greg knew he was going to die even before he saw the incomprehensible madness in the man's eyes, before his blood and rain streaked face contorted into a grimace of pure hate. By the time the realisation came to him he was less than a yard away and the concern that had lent impetus to his sprint toward the bloody man made it difficult to stop. The waterlogged sidewalk didn't help either. He tumbled awkwardly into the man and caught a whiff of something strange. Like something burning, maybe a steak that had been left under the broiler for too long. Pain and a feeling of breathlessness followed and Greg knew he had been punched in the gut. With all his strength he pushed himself away from the killer, alarmed that he didn't budge an inch. He tried to run away but his legs gave out beneath him and he landed heavily on the ground. A bolt of pain shot through his body and a hand went to his stomach. It came away red and wet and with horror Greg realised he hadn't been punched in the stomach, he had been stabbed. His terror multiplied tenfold when his attacker stepped over his hunched body and headed toward the arched doorway of the bank. Toward Vikki! He did his best to rise but pain and loss of blood would not allow it. He could only turn his head up to the sky and say a prayer to however was listening. He spied one of the gargoyles up high on a ledge of the bank's tenth floor and mouthed a silent prayer.

"Help… me…. Please!"

And the gargoyle moved.

Everything went dark for a minute as Greg fought against the effects of shock. The killer was moving slowly but deliberately toward Vikki, the poor girl too terrified to move. Those twitchy, jerky limbs getting ever closer to the girl he loved. The rusty knife the killer carried cutting the air between them.

There was a loud thud that caused Greg's eyes to snap open. Something had landed heavily on the ground between Vikki and her assailant. It was black, slick and shiny and for a second Greg thought that somebody had thrown a huge garbage bag out of a tenth storey window. The image would be faintly ridiculous of the garbage bag hadn't begun to rise, taking form, a horned head rearing up to face the killer. The dark creature then spread its massive ragged wings revealing a familiar logo set in a gold disc and it was then that Greg knew.

Some people said it was a demon, summoned by Gotham's founding fathers and bound by magic to protect the city.

Some said it was a genetically engineered creature from the Cadmus facility.

Others said that it was just a normal guy who'd devoted his life to becoming the peak of physical and psychological perfection.

None of that mattered. What mattered was that it was real. Gotham's dark saviour. The Batman.

The killer slashed wildly at The Batman who casually dodged. What happened next was too fast for Greg to see but the next thing he knew The Batman has disarmed his assailant and hoisted him up by the lapels of his trench coat. Vikki had by now gathered her wits and rushed over to attend to her injured boyfriend. His head spun and he knew that he would not remain conscious for long. He gathered enough of his strength to assure Vikki;

"I think… I'm pretty sure I'm going to be okay!"

He managed a smile in spite of the blood gushing from his midriff swirling into the rain.

It was difficult to hear over the roar of the thunder but the killer seemed to say something to The Batman. Whatever it was The Dark Knight was not amused and he attacked the maniac with renewed vigour. In a few seconds the killer lay on the ground, battered and broken. Then he began to laugh. A creepy mocking laughter that infuriated The Batman and chilled Greg and Vikki to their very souls. Before Greg succumbed to the dark embrace of unconsciousness he remembered the killer, babbling incomprehensibly as he pulled open the lapels of his trench coat to reveal two words carved crudely into his bare chest.

SILENT HILL


	2. Chapter 1

CHAPTER 1

Police Commissioner James Gordon took a deep drag on his cigar, grimacing as his lungs wheezed in protest and kicked hot gravel into his throat. The swarthy orderly had confiscated his wallet, his gun and his Zippo but allowed him to take his lit cigar through the gate. Twenty years as Gotham's Police Commissioner had earned him some concessions. His hands trembled ever so slightly as he walked the length of the seemingly endless corridor trying to block out the screams, the laughter, the pleas and the threats coming from the cells. He half jumped as a chalk white face appeared in the tiny window of a cell door to his right.

"Welcome to Hell Jimmy."

Blood red lips puckered against the four-inch thick Plexiglas, a slug like tongue snaking through yellow teeth, lapping at the glass.

"You really should visit more often. I was beginning to think you didn't love me any more. C'mon gimme a kiss!"

A frozen grin became a predatory leer. Gordon composed himself. It was only a matter of time until _that_ one escaped again but for the moment he was going nowhere.

Arkham Asylum for the criminally insane. The worst place on Earth. He had walked through its heavy iron gates countless times over the years but he had never become accustomed to the sense of dread that seemed to emanate from the dark stone walls. Looking at it from outside it was hard to imagine the place being conducive to anyone's mental health. It looked like something out of _The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari_. From the inside, however, it was even worse. Like being trapped in the innards of a vile monster. It's fetid organs black and rotted. He shook such unwholesome thoughts from his mind.

The lights had been dimmed, the inmates were supposed to be sleeping. It did little to alter the Commissioner's anxiety.

"Did you manage to find a sheet on the perpetrator?"

A voice rasped from the darkness between two lamps embedded in the walls. Gordon started.

"I swear one of these days you'll give this old man a heart attack."

A familiar figure half emerged from the darkness. The dull light of the lamps reflected in the ripples of sculpted armour.

"Assuming lung cancer doesn't finish me off first." He took another drag of his cigar.

"Got the file right here."

He tossed a manila envelope into the darkness, a gloved hand shooting out to catch it. The Batman stepped fully into the light. The usual scowl of concentration on the visible half of his face.

"You look terrible." The Batman stated without looking up.

"I haven't had a wink of sleep since this guy came to town. Eleven couples in just over forty-eight hours. Would have been twelve if you hadn't happened upon him. No pattern, no motive, no MO. All we could do was chase our tails the whole time. Thank God you got him."

The Batman continued to read. The asylum had fallen strangely quiet. The inmates cowed by the presence of their nemesis.

"Jason Pryzlak." Gordon recited the information from the file, more to break the silence than anything.

"Forty seven years old. Born here in Gotham. Dropped out of school, worked a series of odd jobs here and there. Arrested age 17 for breaking and entering. Again at age 21 for aggravated assault. Got time off for good behaviour then drifted around for a while. After a few years he moved to Silent Hill where he worked as a janitor at uh… Midwich Elementary School. He was there a good few years until he was charged for," Gordon ran a hand through his greying hair. "Indecent assault on a minor."

The Batman read and reread the pages of the dossier. Gordon wondered what he was looking for.

"Anyway he did his time for that, was put on the Sex Offender's Register and then drifted around for a while until the state got him a job as an orderly in Brookhaven Hospital. After that it looks like he kept his nose clean. Then two weeks ago he didn't turn up for work. He'd disappeared. Didn't tell anybody where he was going. Didn't pack a change of clothes. Didn't even take his wallet with him. In fact the only thing he took was-"

"The kitchen knife he used on his victims." Satisfied The Batman handed the folder back to Gordon.

"What we don't know is why he came back to Gotham and what triggered this God awful killing spree. We've been trying to question him for the past few hours but he's a vegetable. Completely non-responsive."

"The wounds on his chest. Self inflicted?"

"We think so." Concurred Gordon. "There are traces of Pryzlak's own blood on that knife."

They stopped at the door to the cell that held the murderer, Jason Pryzlak.

"The kid. How is he?" enquired the vigilante.

"He's in Gotham general. He's lost a lot of blood but he's stable."

Presently the cell door swung open and a haggard looking man in his late thirties stepped into the corridor, locking the door behind him. It was Lieutenant Kitch. He nodded a greeting to Gordon, double taking at the sight of the Commissioner's strange companion.

"He's all your Commish. I've been breaking his balls for the last half hour. Didn't get a peep out of him."

"Thanks Kitch. You go grab yourself a cup of coffee."

The Lieutenant nodded and, stifling a yawn, walked back the way they had come.

Gordon took a deep breath.

"You ready?"

Almost imperceptibly The Batman nodded.

Gordon turned the key in the lock and, leaning into it pushed the heavy door open. Both men stepped into the cell. Instantly they noticed the abrupt drop in temperature. The vague smell of something burning.

The padded cell was small and unfurnished. Its occupant sat hunched in the far corner, unmoving, catatonic. Jason Pryzlak was short and gaunt. His long greying hair clung together in greasy locks. His grey eyes were now glazed and vacant.

Quickly crossing the room Gordon reached up and switched off the small security camera hanging from the ceiling. Turning to The Batman he said,

"You've got two minutes. You know the rules."

Without saying a word Gordon left the room, locking the door behind him. Alone in the darkened corridor he stubbed out his spent cigar, hoping that the vigilante would be able to provide some answers.

In the gloom of Pryzlak's cell The Batman stared at the murderer he had apprehended a few hours ago. He had stalked twelve couples, killing eleven. By blind luck he had caught the psychopath in the midst of his attack on the teenage couple while on patrol. The killings had shown no pattern other than the fact that the victims were all couples and had died of multiple stab wounds. The couples had been of many different ages and ethnic groups from totally different backgrounds. But The Batman had no doubt that the killings conformed to some twisted logic exclusive to the killer. Hunched in the corner Pryzlak continued to stare into space seemingly unaware of the Dark Knight's presence. The Batman had formed a hypothesis, and its implications were deeply disturbing.

The Batman growled through grated teeth,

"You killed twenty two people over the last two days. I want to know why."

Pryzlak looked up, the presence of the other man finally registering.

"Sacrament." He muttered.

Snarling, the dark clad vigilante picked Pryzlak up by the collar of his straight jacket.

"These killings were completely random. Were you just trying to get my attention?"

The killer's eyes lit up, a sinister grin forming on his lips.

"That's it isn't it?"

Enraged The Batman effortlessly lifted the killer into the air and tossed him across the room. He had promised Gordon that he would not hurt the psychopath and while he had no intention of breaking that promise he would bend it as far as was necessary.

He cupped a gloved hand beneath the killer's jaw and drew him up so that they were face to face.

"Why, Pryzlak? Why did you kill those people?"  
When the killer spoke his voice had altered completely.

"Silent Hill is a quiet, peaceful resort town nestled around the beautiful and picturesque Tolouca Lake."

His tone was light, jovial, the delivery of a salesman.

"Popular with honeymooners, families, the elderly and college road trippers alike. There's something for everyone at Silent Hill. Enjoy the tranquil beauty of Rosewater Park, an area of astonishing natural beauty overlooking the lake. Or if its excitement you're after why not visit the ever-popular Lakeside Amusement Park with its fantastic rides, spectacular games it's a great choice for all the family."

Pryzlak's arms and legs had begun to stiffen. His fingers began twitching, his knees jerking involuntarily. His neck strained, the jugular veins throbbing. If he was having a seizure the look on his face didn't show it. He was like a travel agent delivering a rehearsed speech.

"Or why not relax at one of our many bars and restaurants?" he continued. The Batman noticed the acrid aroma of burning meat emanating from the killer.

"Or bowl the night away at the Bowlarama?"

The strain was now evident in Pryzlak's voice and he began to shout,

"WHATEVER YOU'RE LOOKING FOR IN A VACATION EXPERIENCE SILENT HILL HAS IT ALL!"

Before The Batman could question the killer any further his body went limp, his head lolling to the side, as if the sales pitch had drained all the strength from him. Disdainfully The Batman released his hold of Pryzlak and he landed in a crumpled heap on the floor. Several seconds passed.

"When I caught you tonight you said something to me. Do you remember what it was you said?"

The killer lay motionless. Only the rise and fall of his chest gave any indication that he was alive.

The Batman turned. He would get no answers tonight. Still the words Pryzlak had spoken rung again and again in his mind for they had both shocked and disturbed him. He turned the sentence over and over in his head as he swung back the heavy door, leaving the cell. While they conveyed knowledge that confused and frightened him he could not decipher from them any clear meaning.

"If thine eye offends thee, little Brucie, pluck it out!"

Somehow Jason Pryzlak knew his real name, an extremely dangerous secret. The carving on his chest and the salesman's monologue the killer had just spoken indicated the quiet resort town of Silent Hill. But what was the connection?

"Any luck?" Enquired Gordon.

The Batman shook his head. Interrogating Pryzlak had been a dead end.

But the night was young. And The Batman had many, many methods of extracting information.


	3. Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

_Note From The Author: Firstly I'd like to apologise for how long this chapter has been coming. It's been tricky for me to write as it's largely expositional and exposition isn't my greatest strength. I also thought it might be useful at this point to place this story within the appropriate continuities of both the Batman and Silent Hill sagas. The story is set between Silent Hill 2 and 3. While there are allusions throughout to events within the continuity of Batman and Detective Comics I have not placed this story specifically in the DC continuity although it takes place some time roughly in between the Death In the Family and A Lonely Place Of Dying arcs. Enjoy…_

The cave.

It was a vast hollow expanse deep beneath the foundations of Wayne Manor. Long spiny stalagmites hung from the vaulted ceiling like the gaping maw of some dark behemoth. Floodlights embedded in the rock cast long spindly shadows across its floor, creating small but persistent pools of light on the cold, hard stone.

The essence of The Batman, hewn into rock.

A chilly wind caressed Alfred Pennyworth as soon as the elevator doors swung open, like ghostly fingers running through the sparse silver hair on his scalp. The dry rustling sound of flapping leather wings echoed around the cavernous space and the elderly gentleman gripped his silver tray tightly as he moved toward the glowing screen of the Kray supercomputer at the heart of the cave and the hunched form engrossed in whatever was on the monitor. Alfred fleetingly cast his eyes up at the bustling crowd of endless winged brown bodies huddled inside the stone ceiling and the chill became a shudder. How his employer and dear friend could ever be comfortable down here baffled him.

"French Onion soup, Master Bruce, your favourite."

Declared Alfred as he shifted some loose stacks of papers

The hunched figure Alfred had addressed turned wearily to face him. The meagre light offered by the computer's monitor cast shadows over the man's face accentuating the worry lines etched into his skin by a lifetime of sleepless nights.

Bruce Wayne. The face that had wooed many a glamorous lady was still there though it was obscured by the shadows cast by the monitor's dim glare. Recently steely grey tufts had begun to gather at the temples, a solemn reminder that while The Batman may have the strongest will in the world he was, nonetheless, flesh and blood.

"Huh?"

The gravely voice that responded was that of Batman even in the absence of the suit. Alfred often feared that the boy he had once known would become forever consumed by the nightmarish entity his vengeful imagination had created.

"I have prepared French Onion soup for your consumption sir. Once upon a time when you used to eat I remember you being rather fond of it."

The barest hint of a smile emerged on the younger man's lips. It was short lived.

"Thank you Alfred."

He returned his attention to the monitor. On his master's shirtless back Alfred cast a weary eye on the patchwork of scars, bruises and puckering that was Bruce's torso. Each one a stern reminder of a lesson learned. Another jarring reminder of the man's mortality. The Batman was a wraith, a legend, incorporeal. Bruce Wayne however, was all too human.

Several minutes passed and the younger man showed no signs of prying his attention from the dully-glowing monitor to entertain the aromatic soup.

Alfred noisily cleared his throat.

"It may interest you to know, sir, that the delectable cuisine just next to you took a great deal of time and effort to prepare."

"Uh huh."

"So I would be extraordinarily grateful if you would humour this old man for just a moment and set aside a few moments to allow some nutrition into that wasting assortment of bone and sinew that you call a body."

"Not hungry. Why don't you eat it?"

"I shall do no such thing!"

"Your hypocrisy sickens me, Alfred."

Alfred had noticed his master's voice soften slightly. Their banter teasing what was left of the boy Alfred once knew from the grim, stony façade of The Batman.

Although he had his back to the older man Bruce Wayne could feel the stern gaze of his butler and oldest friend. Raising his hands in mock surrender Bruce allowed Alfred to pour him a small bowl of the steaming hot broth.

"Ever been to Silent Hill Alfred?" Bruce enquired as he tentatively slurped on a spoonful of the steaming liquid.

"Indeed I have sir. As have you. It was a long, long time ago. Why, you couldn't have been more than five years old. We all went, your father, mother, you and I. A very pleasant little resort town it is too. Lovely and peaceful. The lake was particularly tranquil." A haze of nostalgia clouded the eyes of the elderly butler.

"Yes, we had a fine time together, the four of us. But then those were simpler times."

Bruce grunted, apparently satisfied. An abrupt and obnoxious beep trilled from the computer's speakers and with almost supernatural speed Bruce discarded his soup and was once again hunched over the screen.

He had received a message from Oracle. The information it contained seemed to corroborate what little evidence he had amassed so far.

"It's taken me a lot of time and effort," the softness had vanished in his voice and the icy rasp of The Dark Knight had taken over, "But I think I've scratched the surface of Silent Hill."

"Whatever do you mean, sir?"

Bruce went on to explain that beneath the unassuming exterior of the tranquil little resort town was an undercurrent of corruption that local press and authorities had tried very hard to contain. Over fifteen years ago joint investigation between the Silent Hill Police department and that of the neighbouring town of Brahms had been set up to investigate claims of production and distribution of illegal hallucinogens. It had been alleged that Doctor Michael Kaufman, a resident physician at Brookhaven hospital, had been making a drug called PTV from the naturally occurring plant White Claudia and selling it to the tourists. The case had gathered momentum but stalled when the officer in charge had died, seemingly from natural causes. But this was just the tip of the iceberg. Fires, murders, disappearances, freak occurrences littered Silent Hill's history. All seemingly unrelated and unconnected but The Batman's detective skills told him that somewhere in this list seemingly arbitrary atrocities was a pattern waiting to be discovered.

Fifteen years ago, a police officer named Cybil Bennet from Brahms filed a missing persons form for a five year old called Cheryl Mason at the request of her father. A day later her body was found on the merry-go-round at the Lakeside Amusement Park riddled with bullets from her own gun. Eleven years later a store clerk drove two hundred miles to Silent Hill with the body of his wife in the trunk of his car, driving, seemingly deliberately, into Tolouca Lake. At about this time a man was found brutally stabbed to death. Evidence suggested that the killer was his daughter whom he was believed to have been sexually abusing for some time. She was never seen again.

_The connection. What's the connection? And in what way is Jason Pryzlak involved? There's no question he wanted me to go there. What did he expect me to find?_

"There certainly appears to be something rotten at the core of Silent Hill Mater Bruce." Remarked Alfred.

"I think I should go there. See what information I can gather from the police archives. They may have hard copies of files that haven't been digitised, data that I can't access remotely."

"That, of course, is your prerogative sir. Although it must be a very serious matter to draw The Batman from his home turf."

Bruce mused. Alfred had a point. Gotham was in the middle of a particularly nasty gang war. The East side Skulls had begun to infringe on the LoBoyz' territory. Several bloody brawls had occurred in the past two weeks. Could the police force manage this threat without his intervention?

A series of short, sharp beeps from the computer interrupted Bruce's reverie. In a flash he had flicked a switch next to the keyboard. It was Gordon's direct line. He had only used it twice before in all the time they had worked together. This had to be really important.

"Jim? What's wrong?"

Gordon's voice sounded small and tinny through the communicator's speaker but the terror in his usually sturdy voice was all too apparent.

"It's Pryzlak. Nobody knows how it happened. He's escaped… Gone… Vanished…door was locked…. Thin air"

Intermittent bursts of static had begun to drown out Gordon's panic stricken voice, which was very strange given the security of the line.

"Understood Gordon. Batman out."

Jason Pryzlak had escaped from Arkham Asylum.

There was only one place he could be headed.

The Batman snatched up his cowl. His mouth tightened into a feral snarl and his eyes narrowed.

His decision had been made for him…


	4. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

The Batmobile knifed its way along the interstate at breakneck speed leaving a trail of jet-black exhaust fumes and astonished motorists in its wake. Beneath the impenetrable tinted windshield The Batman gunned the engine feeling exposed and vulnerable in the slowly emerging daylight despite the virtually indestructible chassis of his vehicle. A murderer named Jason Pryzlak had escaped from Arkham Asylum with a head start of somewhere between an hour and a half and three hours going off the report of the orderly who had found Pryzlak's cell empty. Despite Alfred's protests The Dark Knight had begun the journey to Silent Hill immediately in an effort to close that gap.

The satellite navigation monitor showed a long stretch of uninterrupted straight road on the freeway before reaching the more treacherous roads that straddled the mountains near Silent Hill, and the vigilante seized the opportunity to review the scant data that Barbara Gordon AKA Oracle had been able to amass for him. Setting the car to cruise control he thumbed a switch next to the steering wheel and the main dashboard monitor sprung to life. Green text crawled across the black screen of the monitor. A series of disturbing thoughts reverberated in The Batman's mind as he read. That knowing sentence that had at once puzzled and angered the vigilante;

"If thine eye offends thee, little Brucie, pluck it out!"

_Pryzlak knows who I am._

_It's entirely possible that he committed a series of murders just to get my attention._

_His ultimate goal seems to be to bring me to Silent Hill._

_Why? _

"Why? _Why_?"

The Batman started.

"What is keeping this child alive?"

The text on the monitor had faded into static onto which ghosted the image of an attractive young woman wearing a nurse's uniform. Her head hung in her hands and she stared imploringly at the camera.

"I can't stand it anymore…"

More static.

"Please…. Help me!"

The image disappeared instantaneously, the text staring innocently back at The Batman as though nothing else had been there. He shrugged. Must have been some kind of interference, most likely a televisual broadcast. All the same something about the young woman had aroused a great feeling of pity and sadness in the heart of the vigilante. She must have been a very talented actress.

He returned his attention fully to the information compiled by Oracle. Silent Hill authorities seemed strangely reluctant to computerise their files and it was to the former Batgirl's credit that she had managed to assemble as much information that she had. Unfortunately it seemed to be simply a more detailed retread of the information in Commissioner Gordon's dossier. However close examination revealed a detail that could potentially shed some light on the case.

Jason Pryzlak had been arrested for an indecent assault upon a minor. At the time of arrest he had pleaded his innocence, stating that he and the victim were in a stable relationship and in love. This had been disregarded as a common delusion among paedophiles and Pryzlak was found guilty and incarcerated. Two weeks later the victim, fourteen-year-old Marcia Herbert had taken her own life. In relation to this tragedy Oracle had attached an excerpt from the testimony of Pryzlak's cellmate on the day that he had heard the news of the young lady's death.

"… So yeah he just sort of moped around for a few hours not sayin' nothin' to no one. Then all of a sudden he starts bangin' on the bars, callin' for the warden. Sayin' all about how the sacrament must begin and demandin' all kinds of crazy shit. What's that? No I don't remember exactly what he asked for, he was askin' for all kinds of stuff. I think there might have been some kinda candles in there. Oh, an obsidian bowl! He asked for an obsidian bowl. I remember 'cause I didn't know what obsidian was but it sounded kinda nice so I looked it up in the library encyclopaedia-"

Sacrament.

When The Batman had questioned Pryzlak in Arkham he had mumbled something about a "sacrament" being the reason for the murders he had committed. Nothing in his file indicated that Pryzlak had been religious.

The roads soon began to wind and curve erratically and The Batman was forced to take the wheel. Still he turned the matter over in his mind. He punched a button near the monitor activating a remote link to the computer in The Batcave. It was a long shot but perhaps he might glean some insight by investigating all data on young Marcia Herbert. The vigilante navigated the treacherous roads as the cave's supercomputer fed lines of data onto the small dashboard monitor. He was only able to take his eyes off the road for long enough to catch snippets as the text streamed down too fast for him to read.

"Marcia Elizabeth Herbert"

"Orphaned age four"

"Raised in Wish House Orphanage"

"Cultish"

"Brain washing"

"Unorthodox and controversial religious instruction"

"Deeply troubled"

"Highly uncommunicative"

As the road finally evened out the ghost of a smile played on The Batman's lips. He had made a connection and while for the moment it raised more questions than it answered he felt certain that a missing piece had fallen into his lap.

The dewy mist of early morning was thick in the air, almost obscuring the sign that greeted the dark clad vigilante as he slowly eased off the accelerator. Unassuming white lettering smiled at him from a faded oxford green background.

Welcome To Silent Hill.

While not the smallest of towns its size was miniscule compared to Gotham. Finding Pryzlak in this place would pose no significant problems for The Masked Manhunter.

_You wanted me here, Jason. Here I am. And when I find you there'll be-_

Suddenly the steering column locked and the rear of the car fishtailed. Frantically The Batman stomped on the brake and pulled at the wheel but the car was completely unresponsive. Even the monitor had gone dead. All the Dark Knight could do was brace for impact and hope that no early morning joggers crossed the path of the out of control car.

Feels like a blowout. But that's impossible. Tires are re-enforced with Kevlar, filled with petroleum jelly.

The front fender butted a railing, the angle thankfully sending it careening across the road rather than over the edge and down the hillside.

The Batman was still desperately working at the lifeless controls when a parked van rushed to meet the Batmobile.

Then everything went black.


	5. Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

_Note from the author: Thought I'd given up on this did you? Ha ha, not a chance! I've been touring with a theatre company for two months and haven't been home to work on this. Fortunately now I have nothing but time so I'm free to work on this and other projects. How I'll pay the mortgage, God only knows, but hey! Hope this chapter is worth the wait. WIth luck I'll have the next chapter ready in time for Halloween..._

Consciousness returned to The Batman in the thick, nauseating waves that often accompanied concussion. He closed his eyes and concentrated solely on taking deep, relaxed breaths. Eventually the nausea and disorientation passed. He took a few seconds to take stock of his physical condition. His head had collided with the steering column but other than that he had survived the crash relatively unscathed. Blood trickled from behind the cowl but thankfully his nose hadn't been broken. Rising slowly he wiped the stray blood with the back of his glove and surveyed his surroundings. He had been lying on asphalt a few yards away from the spot where minutes ago the Batmobile had collided with a parked van. He vaguely remembered climbing out of the vehicle shortly after impact but wasn't sure why he had left the relative comfort and security of the vehicle. Had he seen something? Or someone?

A fog had descended upon the town far thicker than the usual dewy mist of an early spring morning. The Batman drew himself to his full height and peered into the mist toward the muted silhouettes of the surrounding buildings.

_I'm sure I saw something. Why can't I remember? Must've been the bump on the head._

Turning back upon himself the injured vigilante observed the extent of the damage to both his own vehicle and the van he had hit. The damage to his own vehicle seemed largely superficial but much to his chagrin the Batman's repeated attempts to activate the 'mobile's engine produced absolutely nothing. Worse still attempts to activate the Batmobile's onboard computer and defence mechanisms proved equally fruitless.

_What could have caused this?_

The grim vigilante wondered as he sat in the drivers seat, mute lifeless controls

stared back at him. Leaving the lifeless husk of the Batmobile he inspected the van. While the damage to the front end seemed no less peripheral than that to his own vehicle the van's engine was equally reluctant to turn over. Resolved to patrol the town of Silent Hill on foot, from the rooftops The Batman searched the van's passenger seat and glove box for a map of the area, hoping against all odds for a stroke of luck in this baffling and disturbing case. His hopes were soon dashed when his vigorous search yielded nothing but a blank sheet of paper, dog eared, tattered and worn but completely blank on both sides. Snarling with frustration he lay the paper on the dashboard and slid back a wafer thin panel on his black glove to reveal a tiny computer screen. Perhaps he could download a soft copy of the map to his palm top computer from the mainframe in the cave. For a few tantalising seconds the boot up sequence was displayed on the miniature screen but it spluttered and died with coughing fits of static. Without a map a detailed search of the area could prove extremely long and tedious. In a fit of anger the dark knight drove his fist into the dashboard. The force knocked the worn piece of blank paper from its resting place and into the passenger side foot well. The great detective casually observed it's fluttering descent, his eyes widening in shock when he noticed that when it came to land, writing had miraculously appeared on its surface. He snatched it up. The writing was small and neat but unmistakably that of a child.

It read;

Dear Mommy and Daddy,

Now you are gone and I miss you. Everyone is being real nice and trying to keep my mind off you but I think about you all the time. Every night I dream about that awful man and the awful thing he did. I hate him! I hate him so much it makes my face go all hot and I can't stop crying. Alfred is doing the best job of taking care of him. I love Alfred. But he isn't you! Everywhere I look people are around me but I've never felt so alone. I feel so sad and angry sometimes I find it hard to think. I know I must try harder. I want to do well at school so I can make you proud of me. Maybe become a doctor like Daddy. I want to help people. I'm sorry. I'm crying now and I know I shouldn't. I must be strong.

I must!

Your loving son,

Brucie

x

What was this? Some kind of sick joke? The Batman crushed the telltale slip of paper in his fist. Taking a deep breath he slid it into a compartment in his belt. It would be studied, analysed. Then destroyed. He did not know how Pryzlak had managed to find his secret or why he was pursuing this bizarre vendetta against Gotham's protector, but the murderer would pay for taunting him like this.

_Press on. Find him!_

The mist showed no sign of clearing but he waved a gloved hand to try to clear it anyway, mildly shocked that he could hardly see it. Slowly, deliberately The Dark Knight glided through the mist, a phantom shadow in the relentless white fog. With no comprehension of his surrounding his march seemed to take forever and he quickened his pace, sheer instinct guiding him through the white-out. In the distance a small dark shape formed. Flickering, insubstantial, a black smudge. He took a few steps forward but the image neither solidified nor grew larger. He stopped dead and stared at the shape, squinting, willing it to assume a solid form. Was this what he had seen before? Instinctively a hand went to his belt and flicked a toggle.

_Infa-red, thermograph. Nothing! Too bright to risk using night vision. What is that thing?_

As he took a step further the radio receiver in his cowl emitted a burst of static. The Batman clawed at the volume control on his belt but the cacophony of sound was relentless, seeming to grow louder as his frustration increased. Indistinct sounds crackled through the static. Voices, half formed words, a cry of fear... Two deafening gunshots. He ripped the earpiece from his cowl as the sound of the gunshots danced in his eardrum. Tinny but persistent the awful noises continued to pour from the radio's earpiece until it was crushed by a black booted foot.

For a few seconds The Dark Knight stood in the mist. Alone.

The ringing in his ear quickly subsided. Replacing it was the distant but unmistakable sound of a child crying.  
It was then the mists began to part.  
What had been a nondescript blur had, in the absence of the mist, solidified to form a tiny shape. A lone little boy, obviously the source of the sound, was hunched over on his knees about ten yards ahead. Batman approached slowly, not wanting to frighten the child. If he was in a state of distress, shock, or even injured then the sight of a giant bat emerging from the mist could only exacerbate the child's condition. As he slowly, gently approached he began to see more clearly the boy's gaunt, almost skeletal frame and the way that his deep sobs racked and convulsed his frail body. What he saw when he got closer caused him to stop dead in his tracks. The boy raised a hand to his face to wipe at the tears that came frequently and heavily, causing the sobbing to become an eerie throaty gurgle. Where the poor child's hands should have been lay fingerless stumps, the pallor of the flesh a sickening grey like bad meat. Muscles and bones seemed to pulse within the stump as it wiped what looked like blood from his eyes and half formed stub of a nose. A flat cap on the boy's bowed head obscured his face but black, oozing blood spattered down onto a white school shirt and navy blue blazer that looked vaguely familiar to the advancing detective. Horrified, Batman realised that the boy seemed to have no skin. Muscle tissue was clearly visible on areas not covered by the school uniform and thick pus oozed onto the white fabric of the shirt turning it a sickly yellow. The veteran crime fighter fought to control his revulsion, wondering instead what terrible accident the luckless child must have endured to disfigure him so horrifically. Overhead the mist had begun to dissipate revealing instead an impenetrable blackness.  
Batman was now standing over the boy whose crying seemed to have escalated into some kind of terrible seizure, his back arching in spasms as he coughed up thick black fluid, spewing it onto the asphalt at his knees. Taking the child tenderly by his frail shoulders The Batman brought his face down to meet the boy's, a vile smell like rotting meat assailing his nostrils.

"It's alright son, I'm going to get you to a doctor."

The boy abruptly became absolutely still. The coughing and the sobbing ceased immediately and the boy was completely still and silent, his head still bowed, blackish blood and pus dripping heavily from beneath the cap. The spluttering drops the only sound.  
Batman tried to comfort the boy.

"I know I look scary but-"

The words became caught in his throat as the child looked up. His face was completely devoid of features, a membranous sack of pulsating muscle from which two milky white eyes stared at him, the black bloody tears still oozing from their gaping tear ducts. A slit like mouth opened in the pulsing fleshy face, belching out a smell of blood, faeces and chemical disinfectant. A hospital smell.  
A pitiful mewl of infinite pain and sadness emitted from the newly formed maw.  
The Batman barely had time to digest the horrendous sight when the creature vomited up a soup of bloody mucus and fleshy pink maggots which leapt at his face, eating through his kevlar weave cowl like concentrated acid, threatening to dissolve his face, his skull, his brain.

Ripping off his cowl The Batman plunged into the inky darkness, temporarily blinded. As he raced hopelessly blinded into the unknown depths he became he became dimly aware of the vengeful whoop of an air raid siren.

The old kind.


	6. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

Sightless and unmasked The Batman dove into the unknown depths of Silent Hill. His head down to obscure his face, instinct his only navigator he fought to take control of his senses. Harnessing years of training and discipline he fought his revulsion at the sickly hospital smell of the gooey maggot like parasites that still clung to him, his sharp ears trying to block out the deafening howl of the siren to hear any approaching threat.

_Have to find somewhere deserted. An alley. A doorway. Anything._

Bearing left, hoping to find a sidewalk the unmasked detective suddenly became aware of a heavy, fluttering sound. Wings. Large, leathery and powerful. A short piercing screech was his only warning before razor sharp claws slashed at his shoulder, the weight and power of the unseen creature sending The Batman tumbling to the ground, the fluttering sound passing over his head.

The wind knocked out of him, he had only a few moments to gather his senses as he heard the ominous sound of the wings return. The creature, whatever it was, was coming around for a dive, intending to finish him off.

_No choice. Got to chance a look around._

His eyes burned from the attack but fortunately his cowl had taken most of the damage. He forced them open, tears streaming down his cheeks. Slowly the world unfurled to him in a monochromatic haze. It was dark. Far too dark for this time in a spring morning. The mist hung in sparse strands around a slate grey sky that threatened to become pitch black. The street lights offered no illumination, nor were there any lights on inside the buildings. Silent Hill was a ghost town. Looking skyward he saw the vague silhouette of the thing that had attacked him and was now swooping in for the kill. It was far too large to be either a bat or a bird and the unearthly screech it had emitted was not consistent of any animal that he knew of. Certainly not anything that was indigenous to these parts.

He snapped his head around, this way and that, desperately searching for a means of escape. To his left lay the glass front of what looked like a convenience store. Directly opposite he spied a narrow, dark space that could only be one thing. An alley. Sanctuary!

The airborne beast was nearly upon him. A gloved hand shot to a compartment in his belt, drawing out three small darts. They were laces with a fast acting neurotoxin, more than enough to temporarily paralyse a creature of that size. He waited until the brute was almost upon him, his damaged eyes trying to discern details in the dark haze of his vision. It glistened, red and wet, patches of wiry fur sprouting here and there, its head elongated and strangely distorted. Milky white, beady eyes peered down at him past a malformed snout. The creature looked like some kind of unearthly hybrid between a pterodactyl and a giant bat. Fighting his repulsion he let fly with the darts. His aim was, as always, impeccable. The darts whistled through the air met their target with a dull thud. To his dismay The Dark Knight realised that the creature was somehow unaffected by the poison. Fortunately the impact was enough to alter his attacker's trajectory sufficiently to roll out of its way. The bat like thing shrieked in frustration, wheeling around for another pass.

Seizing his chance Batman ran at full pelt toward the alley, the sound of the beating wings fading under the still present wail of the siren. He plunged into the darkness that would offer him cover and solitude. Hopping over black garbage bags he didn't stop until his foot caught something metallic that clattered to the ground, sending his body slammed into a chain link fence twenty yards into the alley. He stopped to rest, chest shaking, fighting to control his breathing.

_Fight it. Calm down. You're no amateur! You've been through worse. _

There was a thin; rasping screech and The Batman turned his head sharply behind himself, fearing that the creature had come back. Relieved he saw that it was simply the unoiled wheel of the wheelchair he had tripped over. He allowed himself a wry chuckle at the faint ridiculousness of someone abandoning a wheelchair in the alley.

_Curiouser and curiouser._

He mused, wondering how Alice would have reacted if she had found this "wonderland" waiting for her when she crawled through the rabbit hole with its ghostly empty streets and freakish unnatural creatures. He chided himself.

_Calm yourself. You're not a superstitious little schoolgirl; you're a trained detective. There has to be a logical explanation. There's _always_ a logical explanation. _

His pulse and his breathing stabilised and The Batman's clear-headed resolution returned. He set his jaw and clenched his teeth. Someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to stage this little freak show for him. Somebody with a grudge and a wild imagination.

Probably not Pryzlak. Pryzlak was most likely just a puppet, and I'm going to find out who's been pulling his strings.

Looking down at his chest he observed the maggots that the strange creature had vomited on him. Only a few still clung to his body armour. Soon they turned grey and limp, falling to the ground and writhing weakly in their death throes. His armour was pock marked and scuffed where they had fallen, part of the gold disc of his insignia was eaten away. It was fortunate that they had not fallen on his face, that his cowl had taken most of the damage.

He reached into his belt and pulled out a bundle of cloth. It was an emergency mask for situations like this. It was like a black bandana with two eyeholes cut out. It was nowhere near as intimidating as his cowl but it would serve to conceal his identity for the time being.

The siren continued to scream. Spying a door on the other side of the chain link fence he clambered over, a plan of action forming as he climbed. He would break into the most likely deserted building, get some cover, maybe even food and supplies then find a way onto the rooftops and patrol from there.

Overhead the mist had now completely disappeared to reveal a sky as dark as night. Darker even, as the night at least offered moonlight. The Batman usually felt at home in the dark, he revelled in its camouflage; he enshrouded himself in it like a second cloak. But there was something dreadful and ominous about this darkness that he found most unsettling. There was a grim sense of foreboding with the darkening of the sky, that the nightmares he had seen were just a face of things to come. He studied the door's simple tumbler lock. It would be simple enough to pick but would take time, and his instincts warned him that something terrible was on its way. Instead he produced a small vial of acid from his belt. He would burn out the lock and pay for the damage later. The acid hissed and spat, eating away at the rusting metal around the lock. Satisfied that the acid had done its job Batman tried the handle.

It wouldn't budge.

He worked the handle, using all of his strength. Still it refused to move. He threw his weight against the door. It didn't give in the slightest. It defied all sense that a lock that simple could hold. The Batman snarled. He hated this place. It was unpredictable; it defied the cold hard logic and methodology with which he had cracked many a case.

But nothing could prepare him for what happened next.

The ever-present blare of the siren became somehow louder. So loud that The Batman had to cup his gloved hands over his ears for fear that his eardrums might shatter. With a sickly wet sound the wood and brickwork of the building he faced peeled away like rotten skin, falling to the ground where it dissolved and vanished. Beneath it lay a lattice of rusty metal strewn here and there with fleshy lumps of what looked and smelled like rotting meat. He took a step back and noticed that beneath his feet the asphalt had peeled away to reveal the same rusty iron grid work on the ground. Beyond it lay only darkness, as if the walls and floor had become a hideous cage to trap the dark detective in this nightmarish world. It was then that what little darkness there had been in the world simply ceased to exist.

Seconds crawled by.

The Dark Knight opened and shut his eyes, trying to train his optic nerves to adjust to the new darkness, but it was impenetrable.

Then behind him came the sound of footsteps. Slow, heavy, deliberate, flesh creaking on rusted metal. Panic gripped the crime fighter, icy hands clenched at his stomach and squeezed. A thousand unseen horrors rushed to greet him.

Fight it. There is no fear. I am fear!

In a heartbeat he cracked open a chemical flare and dropped it on the ground casting a wan green light on the approaching form. He could make out no details but it was bipedal, humanoid. It shuffled, hunched arms wrapped around itself in a straight jacket like embrace. It lurched towards the light in drunken strides. The Batman assumed a combat stance, a batarang snapping out of his belt and trained at the approaching figure with lightning speed. His lips curled around his teeth in a feral snarl The Dark Knight rasped;

"Don't come any closer. I'm warning you!"

Still the thing approached. Its movements were unnatural, a grotesque parody of human movement that made The Batman sure beyond doubt that his assailant was not human.

"Last chance!"

It grew ever closer. The batarang sailed through the air. If the thing was human then it would collide with its solar plexus. A warning shot. The thing buckled then collapsed onto its matchstick thin knees, finally toppling over onto the flare, casting the world into darkness again.

For a moment the sound of The Batman's breathing was all that existed.

Until it rose.

Drawing itself onto its haunches the vile creature was now fully visible in the light of the flare. Its twisted monstrous form was dull grey and glistened with a mucus like slime. It had neither eyes nor ears. But it had mouths. Dozens of mouths grew from all over its head and body, contorted into the sneering, leering grins of the vile, the depraved, the criminally insane. In unison they began to laugh. Jeering him, mocking him, their laughter drowned out the dying wail of the siren. From out of the darkness came two more, identical figures, the laughter intensifying a hundredfold.

Rage burned deep inside the vigilante. He didn't know what these grotesque mocking creatures were but he had no doubt of their intention.

The Batman wasted no time. Leaping onto the back of the hunched form of the first attacker he soared into the air, feeling the thing's bones crunch wetly beneath his feet. He directed all of his weight and power into a flying kick directed at the nearest creature. It toppled to the ground, writhing in agony and frustration, scrambling to find its feet. In an instant another creature was upon him, diving at him, the myriad of mouths, snarling, spitting, biting. Batman lashed out at the creature, sending it stumbling back, a side kick slamming it hard into the rusty metal wall. Several more identical creatures had now slunk into the alley. Blocking his only means of escape. The Dark Knight's hands shot to his belt, thumbing through, batarangs, shuriken, poison darts, electric charges, grenades…

_No. I'm not a killer! _

Suddenly the creatures halted in unison, their heads cocked, tentatively, seeming to sniff the air. There was a moment of uneasy stillness. A one the creatures turned their eyeless, misshapen heads to the mouth of the alley.

Framed by the alleyway was a figure that made The Batman's blood run cold. Impossibly tall, clad in the same wide brimmed hat and trench coat stood the figure that had haunted his dreams for over twenty years. Silent and faceless it approached. The Dark Knight tried to move but his legs had turned to jelly. Terror had swallowed the crime fighter whole and he could only stand numbly as the monstrous hulk approached. Just as it had dwarfed little Brucie so it stood towering over Batman, its featureless face peering down at him. It raised an arm, a monstrous fleshy stump out of which grew the cannon like chrome barrel of a gigantic revolver. Terror mixed with curiosity when The Dark Knight realised that the gun was not pointed at him but _behind_ him. His head twisted around to see the smiling figures that stood on the other side of the chain link fence. They held hands and laughed, a man and a woman, dressed in their Sunday best. Funeral clothes. With rotted dead lips the man kissed the woman on the cheek and together they laughed as the woman dipped a fleshless skeletal hand into a carton of rotten popcorn.

Too late The Batman threw himself at the chain link fence.

Heat. Light. Two deafening thunderbolts.

Mommy 

Daddy.


	7. Chapter 6

There was silence.

Then came a few spots of rain.

Though there were no clouds.

In his dreams, little Brucie turned to face the hulking creature whose wanton cruelty had taken his parents. In his dreams his little hands balled into fists, quaking with fear and rage. In his dreams he would rain blows on the giant of a man whose face was shadowed by the wide brimmed hat. Tiny, flailing fists would glance harmlessly off the impenetrable hide of the giant man's trench coat. The air would seem to thicken, slowing the speed of little Brucie's attacks, impeding their momentum. Robbing the traumatised boy of his retribution. In his dreams little Brucie's face would become hot and read and tears would stream down his cheeks. While he kneeled besides his murdered parents, sobbing convulsively the murderer would turn and vanish into the shadows. His crime unpunished.

Unavenged.

Now as drops of rain that tasted like battery acid fell on the prostrate form of The Batman his gloved hands quivered with impotent rage. On the rusted metal lattice that was the ground two long dead corpses twitched and writhed in perpetual agony amidst rotten popcorn and Martha Wayne's pearls.

_He just wants the pearls, Mom. Give him the pearls. _

Except he hadn't just wanted the pearls had he? He had been an aberrant force, a symptom of a disease that festered and corrupted all that it claimed. He had felt its presence in Gotham City. That miasma of human corruption that rotted the fibre of morality and suffocated human goodness. Now, in the unassuming resort town of Silent Hill it seemed that The Batman had arrived at the core of corruption, the source of evil. Perhaps this alternate world of darkness, rust and decay was present in all cities, only here the door opened and closed between the world of human perception and this twisted doppelganger.

He tasted rain.

And smoke.

The Batman's eyes were drawn to the throbbing fleshy stump of his monstrous enemy. Acrid blue smoke uncoiled, serpentine, from the rusting, chrome barrel of the gun that took his parents and robbed him of his world, his life, leaving him with nothing but the bitterness and rage to which he gave a form and a name and forged into a weapon to be used to fight injustice and protect the innocent. Words came to him. Memories of a whispered promise that became the manifesto of The Batman.

Criminals are superstitious, cowardly fools. To combat them I must become more than a man… A symbol… A creature of the night… I must become dark and terrible as criminals are.

He was The Batman, a creature forged by rage, tempered by training and discipline. His name was legend. His will was inescapable. He had brought hope to those who lived in the shadow of corruption and fear to those that embraced it.

As the towering grotesque figure turned from him, the gun barrel retreating back into the festering meaty stump righteous anger consumed The Dark Knight. With a roar that would cow the devil himself he launched himself at his faceless enemy. In his dreams he had fallen upon his parents' killer but his attacks had been only the thrashings of a child. He was no child. He had mastered every form of combat designed by man. He had trained with the great martial arts masters of the world and surpassed them all. He would bring justice to this inhuman figure. As the hulking form walked away The Batman launched himself into a _tae kwon do_ jump spinning back kick, using all his weight and momentum to force it to the ground. But now, as in his dreams his attack bounced off his enemy harmlessly, the force of the collision knocking The Dark Knight to the ground. Vaulting to his feet he resumed his attack with double the vigour but again his barrage of blows glanced pitifully off the monster. Still The Batman attacked, striking until his muscles burned and exhaustion stole his strength. All the while the creature in the hat and trench coat slowly walked to the end of the alleyway. The Batman refused to relent, using his last reserves of strength to continue the attack wit renewed vigour but still failing to damage his inhuman opponent. The giant figure stopped, an arm swiped at The Batman, swatting him away as if he were a fly, harmless, insignificant. The sheer force of the attack knocked The Batman clean of his feet, sending him crashing into the chain link wall. Without his cowl to protect it his head took most of the impact. As the shadowy figure disappeared down the alley Batman heard the sirens begin their wail as unconsciousness claimed him.

------------

The veil was lifted. The siren and the impenetrable darkness were gone and the silent mist had returned. The Batman blinked, fighting nausea and disorientation. He seemed to have phased back into the "real" world. As he left the enclosure of the alley and surveyed the quaint but ghostly road he recalled a quote from Lewis Carroll's book _Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There_.

"Are you the dreamer, or merely part of the dream?"

He had heard it spoken by Jervis Tetch, The Mad Hatter. A psychopath. A lunatic. As he slowly got to his feet The Batman supposed that sanity was relative. Despite the blow to the head he did not seem to be badly harmed. He made a conscious effort not to consider what had happened before and set his mind firmly on his goal of apprehending Jason Pryzlak.

_There's a murderer out there somewhere. When I find him, _then_ we'll get to making sense of this._

He was the world's greatest detective. As such he realised that rational thought could be used to solve any problem, accomplish any goal.

But there's nothing rational about this is there Brucie? You just saw your parents murdered again. You've fought creatures that shouldn't exist.

He shook such thoughts from his head. There were rational explanations for everything. He had seen supposed demons, witches, monsters, immortals, all of which had their grounding in scientific fact.

Or perhaps I'm going insane. Perhaps I've always been insane.

Nonetheless, this was no time for introspection. Feeling exposed in broad daylight wearing his flimsy substitute mask The Batman sprung into action. He snapped a grapnel from his belt, launching it up onto the roof of the nearest anonymous red brick building. In his element now he streaked across the rooftops, settling on the roof of a diner called Café 5 to 2. He crouched on the roof and mapped out his plan of action. Swathed in his black cloak he felt his insecurities slip away as he slid into his comfort zone, the psychological armour that The Batman persona provided for him that was as essential and impenetrable as the nomex tri-weave of his body armour.

From his rooftop vantage point The Batman was disappointed to discover that the mist was as dense where he crouched as it had been on the ground, robbing him of the bird's eye view that was an indispensable tool in his crime-fighting arsenal. Tracking down Pryzlak would be difficult.

But then if detective work were easy, everybody would be doing it.

Suddenly a sound split the misty quiet of the streets of Silent Hill. Flinching, Batman feared that the wail of the sirens would return him to the ungodly "other" world where the stench of evil was suffocating and the darkness was an enemy rather than a friend and ally. Fortunately the thunderous noise that rang through Silent Hill's deserted streets seemed to be a church bell. The Batman was perfectly still, his sharp ear tracing the source of the noise. Pulling a pair of binoculars from his belt and raising them to his eyes he made out the vague outline of a church due south of his vantage point.

The Batman afforded himself something resembling a smile. His luck was finally changing for the better. The building could provide him sanctuary from the bizarre creatures that seemed to roam the streets while whoever was ringing the bells may be able to give him some valuable information, or at the very least a rough ideas of the town's layout. Springing from the rooftop, gliding from building to building on his cloak The Batman's resolve strengthened. He would solve this case.

On ragged, leathery wings he landed gracefully on the sidewalk directly opposite the Balkan church. It was a charming building, 18th or 19th century and, Batman guessed, probably as old as the town itself. He had barely set his foot on the first step to the large oak doors when he heard a blood-chilling scream. A woman. Launching himself at the heavy doors The Batman burst into the musty smelling chapel. His eyes shot to the altar, which sat below a large mahogany stone cross. He had found his quarry.

Jason Pryzlak stood over the girl, one hand clamped over her mouth, another holding her wrist fast. He brought his face to hers contorted into a mask of rage and hatred, through yellowed teeth he hissed;

"Shouldn't oughta have done that. Shouldn't oughta have rung that bell."

The girl, barely out of her teens it appeared, squeezed her eyes shut in terror as if expecting to wake up after some terrible nightmare. But that would not work. The Batman knew, he had tried it once himself. The Dark Knight's hand shot to his belt, releasing a batarang and launching it at Pryzlak in a single fluid motion. A hollow thud resounded around the cavernous chapel as the customised boomerang connected with Pryzlak's skull. He teetered, stunned, long enough for the girl to scramble out from under him and flee. She wore a strange puritanical style dress, navy blue in colour with white trim at the cuffs and torn collar. Pryzlak clutched his bleeding cranium where the projectile had struck. The girl stared at The Batman in awe, uttering a sentence unintelligible to the Dark detective.

"The demon. Samael is come to visit judgement upon us!"

But The Batman had little time for such ramblings.

"Get out of here, now. I'll deal with this man."

She glanced around furtively before sprinting to the heavy doors. Just as she was leaving she whirled around, pointing at Pryzlak.

"You will be held accountable for your heresies."

And then she was gone.

There was silence. The Dark Knight and his murderous quarry stood facing each other, each man's eyes locked upon the others.

Remember, he has a gun. Distract him. Try to reason with him.

The Batman's hand moved slowly to his belt, producing the letter that he had written as a child. The letter that he had somehow found in Pryzlak's vehicle.

"Where did you get this?" he snarled.

Pryzlak stared blankly at the piece of paper for a second, seeming to text. His eyes widened and pure malevolent hate crept across his haggard features.

"Marcie?"

His hands began to shake.

"Marcie!"

A hand dipped into the inside pocket of the killer's tattered and soiled trench coat. The Batman knew what was coming.

"You bastard!"

By the time Pryzlak had drawn his gun The Batman was in the air, diving to take cover behind the pews.

"You bastard! You stole her letter! You goddamn filthy bastard!"

The killer ranted as he fired blindly. Bullets thudded into ancient wood, spitting out splinters that rained down on the vigilante.

_He's unhinged, flailing. He can't think strategically. I can. Be patient!_

The Batman waited patiently for the barrage to cease, for the gap in fire while Pryzlak reloaded. In his agitated state he predicted that the murdered would take at least three seconds to reload. That was all The Dark Knight needed.

Sure enough the tinkle of spent shell casings rang in the air followed by muffled cursing and a rustle of cloth as unseen hands groped in unseen pockets. The Batman tensed to make his move but was distracted by a curious hum that now filled the church. A slow rumble, almost inaudible at first but steadily growing in volume. A strange and unsettling baritone sung by an invisible choir. Whatever it was had obviously distracted the killer as well so The Batman seized the time to roll out from under the sanctuary of the pews and face his enemy.

He had not expected the sight that greeted him.

Pryzlak stood bolt upright, his arms poker straight at his sides. His eyelids fluttered and his fingers twitched spasmodically. The church was filled with the stench of burning, putrid meat. Pryzlak appeared to be having a seizure akin to the one he experienced at Arkham Asylum while The Batman was interrogating him.

Seconds passed. When the convulsions passed Pryzlak lowered his head, coming face to face with The Dark Knight. The malevolent smile that spread across his face made the veteran crime fighter's blood run cold. He spoke in a strained high-pitched voice;

"Come out and play Brucie."

The giant cross above the alter burst into flames. The walls and ceiling began to blister and peel, melting away to reveal rusted iron skewering lumps of rotted flesh. As The Batman whirled around to the double doors at his rear they fell away like wallpaper revealing only more rusted metal.

The familiar siren wailed anew.

When Batman turned around again he saw that Pryzlak was gone. Instead upon the flaming cross a cruciform figure wailed in agony. It was dressed in the ragged remains of a familiar uniform, its skin puckered and blistered, charred and oozing pus in places. The face was hideously scarred, burned and bruised but recognisable. Carved into the skin of its chest, above its heart was a crude letter R. Its eyes opened and stared down at him, the eyeballs nothing but melting white jelly. It opened a mouth filled with broken teeth and hissed.

"Your fault!"

The Batman knew his accuser. Knew he couldn't possibly be facing this young man.

Jason Todd, Robin II was _dead_.

The cross lowered to the ground on chains, seemingly taking on a life of its own. It shot toward The Dark Knight with alarming speed.

The Batman barely had time to glance around the room before diving out of the way of the flaming, vengeful abomination.

The doors had disappeared leaving a rusty iron cage to trap him.

There was no way out.


	8. Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7

Jason Todd, the second young man to bear the mantle of Robin, was dead. The Batman knew this.

The Joker murdered him several years ago. He had dug the teenager's battered remains from the rubble of a warehouse blown up by the maniacal clown. He had held his young protégé in his arms and wept over the young body.

And yet in the town of Silent Hill, a place of nightmares where the façade of quiet resort town masked the essence of Hell itself, The Dark Knight was brought face to face with something he knew to be impossible.

A ghastly, terrifying incarnation of Jason Todd.

It was mounted Christ-like, sheathed in flame, on a giant cross that had been the centrepiece of the Balkan church, rusted nails protruded from broken wrists. Its flesh cooked and bubbled beneath the skin. Choking black smoke rose from the contorted body that writhed in perpetual agony. It still wore the shredded remains of the Robin suit. The letter R was carved deeply into its flesh.

The church had now disappeared, crumbling away like old paint on a damp wall. The ceiling had vanished revealing an endless void of darkness. The now familiar metal walls eroded with rust and decay remained. A cage to trap Gotham's vigilante.

"Your fault!" hissed a jagged mouth of broken teeth; blood trickled down its skin.

With unnerving speed the huge cross on which the former Robin was suspended shot toward the vigilante, hanging from wires that extended forever into the darkness above them. Every instinct screamed at him to evade the attack but something rendered The Dark Knight immobile. Whether it was fear or a subconscious urge to be punished by the former protégé who had died as a result of his fallibility, not even he knew.

With a piercing shriek of triumph the monster collided with The Batman in a shower of sparks and boiling hot blood. The sheer force of the onslaught sent him careening into the rusty iron bars behind him, tearing the air from his lungs. The cross bearing the burning monstrosity returned to the centre of the cage, righted itself and rose into the air, preparing for another attack.

_Whatever it is. It's not Jason. It's NOT Jason._

"I trusted you." The writhing creature spat. "And you let me die. You _let_ them do this to me!"

Every word was a dagger in the dark hero's heart. He had sworn never to forgive himself for the death of his teenaged partner. Now a voice long dead, a voice that had haunted his dreams almost as much as the murder of his parents compounded his guilt.

The giant cross hurtled toward him once again and the Dark Knight Detective evaded the attack with a diving roll. Again the cross righted itself, slowly turning to face its intended target. This time Jason Todd's deformed face carried a look of pathos.

"I would have done anything for you Bruce, and you let them do this?"

Behind the improvised mask, tears formed in the vigilante's eyes.

"I tried." When he spoke it was the voice of Bruce Wayne, not The Batman.

The milky, melting pools of Jason Todd's eyes closed. With a shriek of agony it freed its left hand from the nail that held it, the flesh making a sickly tearing sound.

"You tried? YOU TRIED? GOD DAMN YOU!"

The cross bolted forward again and this time not even The Dark Knight's speed could save him. With inhuman strength the creature grabbed him by the throat and lifted him high above the ground. The smell of burning flesh filled his nostrils, the smoke stung his eyes. The monstrous grip squeezed and pure agony racked The Batman's body. The flames that engulfed the boy quickly enveloped the vigilante and even through the bat armour they tore mercilessly at his skin.

"Feel that? That's what it's like for me all the time." The fury in the boy's voice was tinged with sadness.

The world began to fade in bursts of crimson and tan and as his eyes slowly shut The Batman lazily realised that the oxygen supply to his brain was being cut off. The burning all over his body subsided to a merciful gentle numbness.

"Your death is coming Batman. Embrace it!"

_Yes. It's my fault Jason died. This is the death I deserve._

The voice filled The Dark Knight's head, but a small part of his mind knew that it was not his own. The Batman would not allow himself to be swallowed by death. His warrior's spirit was too strong.

"No!"

The Batman's eyes opened and a hand shot up to grab his attacker's wrist.

"You're _not_ Jason Todd!"

With his free hand he reached into his utility belt and pulled out a Batarang. Without hesitation he drove the sharp edge into the creature's forearm, praying that whatever it was had nerve clusters.

With a roar of agony and rage the creature relaxed its grip and The Batman dropped heavily to the floor. While his attacker writhed and burned the vigilante drew himself to his knees, sucking in great lungfuls of air. When he turned to face the hideous creature his eyes were narrowed into slits. Batman had returned.

"You thought you could use my guilt as a weapon against me? Think again!"

The cross careened forward for yet another attack but this time the hero was ready. He ran forward and threw his arms around the cross section that held the monstrous parody of the former boy wonder, shifting his body weight beyond the grasp of the creature's free hand. Flames bit at his face but The Batman shut out the pain. The creature's hand scrambled and pounded at his back but was unable to do any real damage. Reaching again into his belt he produced three small capsules, slotting them into the links of the chain that held the cross. They were small explosive charges housing a highly corrosive acid, used for dissolving locks when picking was not an option. Confident that they were in place he hopped back onto the ground. The monster on the cross swooped across the room again, following the same pattern as before it returned to the centre of the cage like room, slowly turning to face The Batman.

"You can't be Jason Todd." Claimed the vigilante as he quickly flipped open a panel housed on his belt. His gloved finger hovered over a tiny button.

"I always taught Jason to alternate his attack strategies."

The button was pressed and in an instant the charges exploded. Two of the three chains supporting the crucifix were neatly severed and the creature dangled pathetically from its one remaining chain. The still flaming monster bellowed with rage and hatred, its free hand flailing wildly. Above it the damaged final chain groaned under the weight it was supporting.

"You can't do this to me Bruce!" the monster made its final appeal; fear drowned the hatred in its voice.

But The Batman was not one to be fooled by the same ploy twice. He snapped another razor sharp Batarang from its compartment.

"Sure I can," the projectile whizzed through the air, severing the chain with a satisfying clang, "I've got a murderer to catch, and you're in my way."

The cross fell heavily to the floor crushing the flailing monster under its weight. Its cries of rage were suddenly silenced.

Exhausted the Batman took a second to recuperate before standing over his fallen attacker.

_So may not be Jason Todd, but I still don't know what you are. _

But before he could crouch to examine the body the cross and the crushed monster beneath it exploded in a roiling cloud of dust. The Batman shut his eyes and held his breath until the little storm of dust passed. When he opened them again there was no sign that the creature had even been there but what replaced it was even more bizarre. Now set into the rusty iron floor was a wooden trap door on top of which lay an unassuming school exercise book. He picked it up, casting an eye over the name on the cover.

MIDWICH ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

MARCIA HERBERT  
4B

A clue had been dropped squarely in his lap but by whom The Batman had no idea. Nonetheless a hypothesis was forming in the mind of the detective. It was obvious that the murderer Jason Pryzlak had been obsessed by this girl. Upon hearing of her death he had been seen to make outrageous demands for bizarre artefacts, amongst which he remembered mention of an obsidian bowl. The Batman's dealings with occultist Jason Blood had taught him that obsidian was believed by some to have magical properties. Marcia Herbert had a troubled past and was raised with unusual, cultish beliefs. Was it possible that she had related some of this knowledge to the murderer Jason Pryzlak?

Suddenly it began to make sense.

Obsidian was used in some spells of resurrection. It was not uncommon for a sacrament to be made prior to the ritual, the taking of life to renew a life. When questioning Pryzlak at Arkham Asylum as to the motives of his murders the killer had responded weakly with the word 'sacrament'. He clearly aimed to use spells he had learned from poor Marcia Herbert's cultist upbringing to bring her back to life. Jason Pryzlak was a murderer, he was also a poor misguided fool who believed that killing the innocent would help to bring back the object of his obsession to the land of the living. There were still loose ends in the theory. Why, for example, did Pryzlak only kill couples, and why did he travel all the way back to his native Gotham to begin the killings. The Batman presumed that it was all to get his attention though for what purpose remained to be seen. Nonetheless his next course of action was clear.

Rites of resurrection typically required an item of personal value to the dead. Marcia Herbert had severe mental health issues and never progressed beyond elementary school.

The Batman hauled up the trap door to reveal a set of stone steps that descended into an inky black abyss. He would have to travel to Midwich elementary school and try to intercept the killer there. He had no idea where this staircase led but it was his only option. He was about to discard the exercise book when a single sheet of paper dropped out. Curious he picked it up. As his eyes glanced over the handwriting a cold feeling gripped the pit of his stomach. For it was his own;

Dear Dad,

I got in trouble at school today. For fighting. Yeah, I know. Its just like sometimes I get so much sadness and anger in me and I feel like it's going to swallow me up. And then when a kid pushes me I just lash out.

I'm sorry.

Alfred took me home. He didn't yell at me and I'm glad. He told me that maybe if I wrote you another letter like the one I wrote just after you died it might make me feel better. He's smart!

It's been two years since you died and a lot of people are telling me that in have to move on and live my life. It's not that easy though is it? Nobody understands. Not even Alfred.

I'm angry Dad. I'm angry at the man who killed you and Mom. I'm angry at the police who let him get away. I'm angry that we live in a world where these things happen and nobody does anything.

I promise. I promise when I grow up I'll make a difference. My grades are getting better. I'll become really smart, I still want to be a doctor. Or a lawyer. I could put all the criminals away if I was a lawyer! I thought about maybe being a cop but then I remembered how you always said that you can't solve crimes with your fists and I think if I was a cop then I'd get really mad at criminals and beat on them all the time.

Anyway now I do feel a little bit better so I guess Alfred was right. I gotta go now because I have homework to do.

But every time I feel like this I will write you and Mom a letter. And hopefully I'll hear your voice in my head telling me what to do.

I miss you.

Your loving son,

Bruce

A single tear rolled down The Batman's scorched cheek. Whatever was happening to him, whatever force was churning up his past to attack him with guilt and sadness he would thwart it.

Without another moment's hesitation he descended the stone steps and disappeared into the darkness.


	9. Chapter 8

CHAPTER 8

The tunnel was obviously man made and it did not take the world's greatest detective to see that it had been unused for some time. Rotted wood and mossy brick stretched endlessly onward into a world of darkness. The sickly smell of damp crept up The Batman's nostrils and he snapped his penlight from his belt, strolling forward into the darkness before he could talk himself into ascending the stairs from whence he came.

He had taken only a few steps when a faint hiss assailed his ears, soft and tinny, interspersed with blinks of silence. He started, fearing that this noise might prove the onset of another attack from some ungodly creature. Peering into the darkness he suppressed a sigh of relief when he located its source.

Several upturned crates had been used to form a rudimentary dining area in an alcove barely ten yards from the steps he had just descended. A large wooden box had formed a makeshift table on which rested several objects enshrouded in shadow, while two smaller bottle crates had presumably been used as chairs on either side. Flicking on his penlight The Batman trained the small but intense beam on the 'table' to reveal the maggot infested remains of a long abandoned meat sandwich, its damp paper wrapper testified that it had been purchased from a fast food outlet called "Happy Burger", alongside the rotten burger were two small bottles partially filled with thick brown liquid which the detective supposed to be some sort of glucose heavy energy drink. More important than the abandoned meal were a hard hat and a small pocket radio that emitted the weak crackle of white noise. Satisfied and relieved at the innocent explanation for the previously unaccountable sound The Batman turned to continue his trek into the darkness but immediately reconsidered. He cast his mind back to his arrival in Silent Hill. He remembered the phantom "boy" who had attacked him in the mist. He remembered the deafening interference that had debilitated his radio earpiece prior to the encounter. Could these abominations be detected by fluctuations in radio waves? He picked the radio up. It was small and lightweight, taking it with him would certainly not impede his investigation. The nightmarish apparitions of Silent Hill had been able to attack him using the element of surprise. It was not something he would allow to happen again. The Batman clipped the radio onto his utility belt and continued down the tunnel.

The tunnel seemed to extend into infinity. The Dark Knight's footsteps echoed in the shadowy space, the lonely drips of falling water his only companions.

As he walked his mind reeled, his logical mindset straining to make sense of the day's events, struggling to formulate a stratagem in the face of madness. His rational mind locked in battle with the superstition and paranoia that were etched into the human condition, two parts of a whole at war with one another, he thought about his friend Harvey Dent, lost forever to that battle. Puddles splashed now beneath his feet and as the wan light from above receded the ground too became less stable, beginning to yield to his weight. The penlight swayed from one corner of the tunnel to the other methodically, thankfully it found nothing out of the ordinary here so far. Tentatively The Batman shone the light directly forward but its intense light was still not enough to penetrate the darkness that lay ahead.

Still he plunged forward, the tunnel seemed endless and all notion of time faded into obscurity and soon The Dark Knight was unable to tell if he had walked this path for hours or minutes.

The radio suddenly emitted a short, violent burst of static before going completely dead.

The detective stood absolutely still, keen ears receptive to even the slightest noise so that the faint droplets of water from above were like the clashing of cymbals.

It came again.

The static increased in volume, building from a faint hiss to an angry roar until it was pierced by something shrill and unsettling.

A muffled, keening sound.

The tears of a child.

Spurred by terror and desperation The Batman plunged deeper into the darkness. His hand clawed at the radio's power switch but the onslaught of sound continued regardless. The thin, potent bean of the penlight zipped to and fro, frantically searching for signs of life. Without warning the static stopped. The voice that followed was so much louder than the muffled crying that it seemed to rattle the timbers of the tunnel.

"**Doctor Stern, please."**

The Batman froze. It seemed to come from all directions at once. The voice that answered was older, rasping.

"**It's out of our hands, Norman."**

"**But Jesus, _look_ at her."**

"**She's alive."**

"**You can't honestly-"**

"**This is beyond us. The child must decide what happens now."**

"**Doc-, Bill, for Christ's sake he's too young to-"**

"Doctor Long, the Waynes were very good friends of mine. Nothing you can say can make me feel any worse about this situation."

The Batman was sprinting now into the relentless dark as a sigh filled with dread resignation whistled through the tunnel like a sickly breeze.

"**What are you going to say to the kid?"**

The penlight's beam pulsed and flickered weakly, its power source seeming to deplete even though its owner knew that it was nowhere near the end of its battery life.

"I…. I don't know."

And then with one last, determined wink the light was extinguished.

And there was only darkness.

But this was not the welcome darkness that had always sheltered and protected The Batman, the darkness that he had claimed as his own and from which he struck at the heart of criminality. This was a thick, almost palpable darkness that seemed to seep through his armour, beneath his skin and chill his very bones. It was a darkness that made him feel naked, vulnerable and alone.

He fought to control his breathing, using meditation techniques he had learned from zen masters and martial artists the world over. Nothing seemed to calm his fluttering heart. Deciding that action, rather than introspection was the best policy at this point he crept tentatively onward. Every step seemed to take an aeon.

One.

Two.

On the third his boot descended in something soft and wet with a sickly squelching sound. Reflexively he brought his foot up and repositioned himself, stepping backward.

It was only when his foot sank into mushy ground that The Batman realised he was sinking. As he struggled to walk on the suddenly viscous liquid surface of the tunnel he became aware of a slimy squelching, ripping sound above his head.

Then, as if bidden by some sadistic force that delighted in the horrors inflicted on the weary crime fighter, the penlight surged back to life.

The tunnel of wood and brick was gone. The light fell upon a surface that glistened with moisture, pulsating, oozing crimson and tan. The walls undulated and constricted, thick, vein like tubes beneath the wet surface pulsed with life. It was like being inside the throat of some great beast. The semi solid ground crawled up The Dark Knight's black boots, conspiring to suck him into its hidden depths. The sound above his head persisted and, with a shaky hand, The Batman brought the light to rest on the domed roof. Shapes pulsed and writhed forming small warty growths here and there about the size of a football, one of which hung barely three feet above the vigilante's eye level. The sickly wet ripping sound began anew and a ragged slit formed in the newly formed pod. With a victorious hiss from within a fragile pink thing emerged. It stretched out, thin, blue veined and translucent. A bat's wing.

Bruce Wayne's boyhood fear, a phobia that he had learned to tame and eventually turn to his advantage suddenly took on a terrible new depth. Years of training crumbling beneath suppressed terror The Dark Knight lurched forward, fighting to free himself from the pulsating quagmire that held him fast.

The creature above freed itself from its sickening cocoon landing with a plop right in front of The Batman just as his forward momentum caused him to overbalance and fall forward. His leading hand, the hand that held the penlight, shot out to stop the fall and was instantly swallowed by the pulsing ooze that was the ground. The hastily abandoned pen light came to rest on the surface casting its beam to a point past the domed ceiling and its ulcer like stalactites. Raising his free hand to maintain his balance The Batman came face to face with the repugnant creature. Its torso was small but densely muscled covered with sparse patches of wiry black fur, translucent pinkish skin scarcely concealing the crimson brawn within. It drew its head upward and he could smell the fetid stink of its breath, a musty, damp smell of dark places, ancient, lost and forgotten. The small creature's eyelids peeled back to reveal sightless milky pools laced with thin red veins, its nose twitched hungrily, appraising the scent of its first meal. The Batman was paralysed with fear as the creature rose upon its haunches, spreading its translucent wings and omitted a piercing shriek that caused the detectives ears to ring. Partially deafened he still fought to free his trapped hand even as the creature's wings began to beat frenziedly, launching itself at the vigilante's exposed face. Only instinct and speed saved him as his free hand swung around, connecting with his assailant in a knife handed strike. Only slightly fazed by this retaliation it wheeled with tremendous speed, needle like fangs chomping at air as if practicing for the moment when they would taste flesh. With Herculean strength and speed The Batman's gloved hand swept around again, this time snatching the creature from the air in mid flight. Its wings beat with savage intensity, its slimy body writhing with a strength that belied its size. With eyes now accustomed to the inky blackness that surrounded him The Batman spied more identical creatures emerging from their fleshy cocoons, wings twitching experimentally, jaws widening to expose jagged fangs.

Terror gnawed at the vigilante's mind as his eyes beheld the perverse birth of these unholy bat creatures. There were too many of them. They would overpower him quickly. As if to emphasise this point the writhing thing in his hand squirmed around, gaining enough purchase to sink its fangs into his gloved hand. He gritted his teeth, the pain was disproportionate to such a small wound but he maintained his vice like grip on the infant monster who seemed content to lap at the small pool of blood that welled in his glove. Mind reeling he forced himself to look beyond the meaty pods in the ceiling and the slowly awakening creatures that would attack him at any moment. In the distance he saw the dull gleam of aged metal glimmer in the illumination of the abandoned penlight. Forcing himself to concentrate, shutting out the relentless writhing and sucking of the monster in his hand and the danger of these newly formed menaces he concentrated on the metallic object in the background. He traced its shadowy form, his heart leaping when he realised its from.

It was the rung of a ladder that lead upwards.

To salvation.

With new strength fueled by hope The Batman wrenched his hand from the gooey mass of the floor. It came away, free but gloveless. As his newly liberated hand fumbled in his utility belt his other launched the captive creature against the fleshy wall of the cavernous tunnel. He winced as its fangs raked his skin. The creature hit the wall hard with a muffled wet thump. His naked hand found the object it was searching for and whipped around, aiming the grapnel gun at the metallic rung. He squeezed the trigger just as the first wave of bat creatures mustered the strength to fly at him. Pressurised air shot the grappling hook into the soft wall of the cavern and with a silent prayer The Batman thumbed the recoil button. The strength of the gadget was, mercifully adequate to lift the exhausted crime fighter out of the fleshy quagmire and drag his fatigue racked body through the air, through a gauntlet of hungry bat creatures. Fangs and claws grazed him as he shot past them but he remained, for the most part, unharmed. Bracing himself against the impact he collided heavily with the ladder, its dull metal rungs protruding through a wall of pulsating crimson jelly.

The fluttering and screeching of the hungry swarm retreated briefly and, knowing that they were merely changing direction The Batman began his ascent, quickly dislodging his grappling hook from the fleshy wall and returning the gun to its compartment in his belt. He placed his exposed hand palm down and flat on the first rung, habit forcing him to preserve his secret identity by not leaving fingerprints on the metal. He clambered up the ladder in earnest, muscled groaning in protest at the day's relentless exertions. Pushing fatigue and fear into the pit of his stomach, he searched within himself for cold steely calm that he felt take over his entire being like a tangible force whenever he slipped the dark cowl over his face as he climbed upwards as the banshee wail of the bat creatures drew closer.

They fell upon him like a gale, a malevolent storm of leathery wings and fangs and claws. Their sonar shrieks filled his ears, wings flapping at hummingbird speed slapping at his face. Needle like teeth found purchase all over his body, effortlessly piercing the bat armour, gnawing mercilessly, glutting themselves on the thin stream of blood that flowed from the small wounds. Still The Batman's ascent continued. The pain was almost unbearable, every bite seemed to stab at the very fabric of his soul. Tiny, scaly tongues lapped at his flesh, hungrily sapping the blood, the strength, the essence from his body. His hands and feet became heavy. As more and more of the disgusting bats clamped themselves to his body he felt the icy grip of despair take hold of him. He pictured his limp, depleted body falling into the abyss beneath him, the flesh being stripped from his bones by a thousand evil things. He could hear they screeching cries of victory as they circled the air above his bones.

_Please. _

He retreated to a place, deep within himself. A place where something dark and fearsome dwelled. A place he had skirted the periphery of several times since his arrival in Silent Hill. Now he threw himself into it headlong. In his mind, in its soul it slumbered. Irritated and enraged to be disturbed again. A broken, terrified child called Brucie threw itself at its clawed feet and wept, begging it to rid him of fear and doubt.

_I need you._

A giant eye flicked open, wreathed in scarlet flame.

_I am vengeance._

His gloved hand clenched the rung tightly.

_I am the night._

The creature within spread its wings and roared fire and fury, fierce and terrifying and beautiful.

He set his jaw, teeth grinding together.

_I am Batman._

With an animal roar he tucked his head into his chest, hands and feet moving mechanically, relentlessly like mighty pistons. Pain was irrelevant. Fear was unthinkable. He continued his ascent, an unstoppable force, propelling himself upwards away from the grasp of doubt and pain.

By the time he tentatively opened his eyes all that they perceived was moss and brick. An upward glance told him that he had reached the top of the ladder. Above him was an iron manhole cover, below him the tunnel plunged into impenetrable darkness.

The misty chill of Silent Hill greeted The Dark Knight when he threw aside the manhole cover and hauled himself into the waning daylight. The steely grey sky tossed drizzle down upon him and he welcomed the refreshing cool on his battered skin. The fall of the rain did little, however, to disrupt the eerie quiet that seemed to hang perpetually in the air and was, in its own way as unnerving as the rotten abominations of decayed meat and rusted iron that lurked within the town's shadowy doppelganger. He was bleeding and exhausted, his black armour pockmarked with tiny holes from which tiny rivulets of blood tricked. It didn't matter. They would heal. He waited until his laboured breathing slowed and his pounding heart relaxed before looking about himself to ascertain where this tunnel had brought him.

He almost burst into laughter, it was so fortuitous.

At his back was the wire fencing of a small power station at the corner of Midwich and Bradbury Street. A few steps brought him in plain sight of the destination that forces he did not yet understand had drawn him to.

The grand old building smiled at him, its amicable colonial charm peeling in patches to reveal rotten wood and rusted metal. A fitting metaphor for the corruption and malevolence that lurked beneath the quaint town's surface.

MIDWICH ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

The Dark Knight Detective spared a moment to take stock of his provisions before entering the school where, he felt with an unnerving certainty he would find the escaped serial murderer Jason Pryzlak. His search of his utility belt yielded a handful of batarangs (he would have to use those sparingly), chemical flares, a taser gun (a short-range weapon that he would rather not get close enough to use), a portable first aid kit, several gas pellets (useless to anything that could see through the thick fog that enshrouded the town), a lock pick and his newly acquired radio (which was, like everything else it seemed, completely silent).

It was hardly a bulging inventory but he had undertaken missions with less. His only prerequisites were a keen analytical mind and his extensive martial training.

With newfound confidence the vigilante started towards the school.

Justice would be done today.


	10. Chapter 9

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 9

The heavy double doors to Midwich Elementary School opened stubbornly and The Batman had barely set foot in the entrance when he heard the scream. A scream he had heard before. Bolting through the lobby and bursting through the doors on the other side The Dark Knight once again caught sight of his quarry. He had emerged in the centre of a long hallway lined with lockers, a large door lying at either end with a heavy looking set of double doors directly in front. To his left, slightly further down the corridor, Pryzlak stood hunched over the prostrate form of a young woman wearing a familiar navy blue dress. To his horror Batman realised that it was the same girl whom he had rescued from the murderer's clutches in the church earlier. Somehow he had caught up with her.

_Failure._

If Pryzlak had heard The Batman's entry into the corridor he made no attempts to show it as he dragged the poor girl across the corridor towards him, his fist clenched tightly in her hair.

"Whining little bitch, I should gut you right here. Now hold still, dammit!"

With a yank that caused his prey to squeal in pain Pryzlak hauled the girl to her feet by her hair, the momentum of this action bringing him face to face with The Batman. The two met each other's stare for an endless moment. Enemies locked together by each other's grim resolution in a stand off set against a background of death pain and torment.

"Let her go Pryzlak!" The Batman hissed, his hand slowly creeping to his utility belt, resting on his tazer gun. He needed the killer incapacitated, unable to escape.

"You!" The killer spat the word out with a mixture of fear, hate and frustration. Agitated and furious he swung the girl around so that her back was facing the door away from The Batman. His wiry arm constricted around her neck.

"You shouldn't be here yet. This isn't what she-"

Before the sentence was over the killer had reached into the coat of his dirty, tattered trench coat and produced a kitchen knife. A kitchen knife identical to the one that should, by all rights, be secured in an evidence room at Gotham Police Headquarters. At the same time the dark clad vigilante whipped the tazer from out of its compartment in his utility belt, striding forward to within the weapon's range.

Suddenly a flower of unbearable pain bloomed within The Batman's abdomen, the intensity and suddenness of which caused the dark hero to drop to his knees. His muscles became suddenly leaden, immobile. An unbearable invisible weight pressed The Batman into the polished wood floor of the hallway and it was all he could do to strain his head upward to face his enemy.

A smile spread across Pryzlak's face as he regarded the now prostrate form of the crime fighter and his lunatic gaze flicked between the he and the terrified captive who shuddered helplessly in the killer's grasp. Slowly and deliberately he moved the gleaming tip of the blade to the small of the girl's back. The girl's eyes widened in terror as the sharp metal bit into her skin.

"If you hurt her…" The Batman threatened through clenched teeth, straining against the unseen force that pinned him to the ground.

Curiously the look of malevolent victory abruptly left Jason Pryzlak's eyes and was replaced by a look of complete and utter vacancy. The knife hand dropped limply to his side while the other arm retained its vice like grip on the terrified young girl.

Despite this the invisible hold on Batman's body only grew in intensity and through the floor the vigilante could feel a strange rumbling.

A low hum, the likes of which he had heard during his previous encounter with Pryzlak in the Balkan church now buzzed in his tired eardrums. It steadily rose into a lilting, monastic chant and the hero was once again aware of the cloying, sweetish smell of burning meat. Unable to move his head now he strained his eyes upward, training his vision on the immobile form of Jason Pryzlak. The air around him rippled and shimmered like the haze caused by a bonfire. The girl shrieked out;

"This is heresy! Xuchilbara's will cannot be corrupted!!"

Pryzlak's eyes fluttered. His body slumped forward yet remained standing, like a puppet dangled on invisible wires. The stench of burning flesh grew in intensity until it became a suffocating miasma, scratching like sandpaper through The Batman's nasal cavities. He choked, spluttering on the invisible fumes, his quaking shoulders straining against the invisible force that held him fast.

Slowly Pryzlak's wiry frame straightened. When his eyes winked open they were no longer the frantic, wild eyes of a the killer. Instead they burned with an almost otherworldly malevolence. A chilling leer spread across his face.

"Are you enjoying our game little Brucie?"

He spoke in a high pitched rasp beyond the usual register of a man of Pryzlak's age. The voice was infantile and feminine. Almost a little girl's voice, but with a ragged husk that implied damaged vocal chords. This only made the malice behind the words was made all the more menacing.

"Do you like to see my puppets dance so?" the child like voice asked sweetly.

" This one's mind is quite broken. Wanna see it do a trick?"

Before The Batman could respond in any way Pryzlak swung the girl round with such speed and ferocity that her feet were lifted from the ground. The knife hand arced around and the deadly blade gleamed maliciously in the overhead fluorescent light, seeming to wink mockingly at The Dark Knight before disappearing bodily into the girl's abdomen.

"NO!" The Batman roared as, spurred by the power of righteous fury, he managed to tear free of the unseen grip that pinned him to the floor. Pryzlak's eyes widened slightly in surprise as the exhausted vigilante lumbered toward him. The Batman's energy reserves were depleted by the struggle against the forces that held him but adrenaline surged him forward into a last - ditch assault. He pitched forward concentrating all of his weight and momentum into a single right hook. Pryzlak dodged the blow with unnatural speed. Batman's arm scythed around, fingers stiffened into a knife hand strike to the temple. The blow was intercepted and Pryzlak's fingers gripped The Batman's gauntlet with vice like strength. The girl hung lifelessly in Pryzlak's free arm and with a smirk he casually tossed her aside like a discarded doll. She crashed into a locker with a hollow thud before landing heavily on the floor. A dark crimson pool slowly began to spread beneath her.

"See that, little Brucie?" Pryzlak enquired sweetly in the child's voice. The killer's fingers bit into the black alloy of the vigilante's gauntlet and it hissed and spat as though being penetrated by white hot metal.

The Batman snarled and his free, gloveless hand clenched into a quaking fist. Channeling all his rage and anger from hip to shoulder to hand he delivered a devastating blow to Pryzlak's jaw. Bone crunched satisfyingly beneath Batman's knuckles but the killer didn't even wince.

"Uh-Uh!" He chided musically before striking the vigilante in the temple with the butt of the knife. The world lurched sickeningly and The Batman struggled against the embrace of unconsciousness as he tumbled to the ground once again.

Pryzlak was astride him before he could summon the energy to rise. He waved the bloodied knife above The Dark Knight's face. Droplets of an innocent young woman's blood fell onto his face.

"Don't worry Brucie. I'm not going to kill you." He teasingly carved a small nick in The Batman's flimsy auxiliary mask just above the eyebrow.

"Our game is far from over." Grinning he pointed at the bleeding girl.

"_That_ is another death you have been powerless to prevent." The killer cocked his head to one side. He still spoke in the high pitched yet gravely voice of a young girl.

"I wonder how that makes you feel. Do you feel the rage burning inside you Brucie? The hatred?"

The Batman could indeed feel the fury burning within him, incensed by frustration, sadness and failure. The feelings of anger and helplessness that had dogged him since that fateful night on Crime Alley that had forever altered the course of his life gnawed at his spirit more ferociously than ever.

"I will stop you!" The Batman promised through clenched teeth, his voice catching in his throat.

Pryzlak leaned forward until his nose was almost toughing his prey's. The smells of decay and burning meat that emanated from the murderer made The Batman want to gag. His tongue slithered obscenely over his dry lips.

"I can taste your rage." He sighed.

From out of nowhere the hum of unseen voices engaged in choral chant buzzed in the Batman's ears and the sound filled him with inexplicable nausea. His stomach cart wheeled and his muscles stiffened. An icy cold filled the room, sinking through the bat armour and penetrating his entire body. His lungs spasmed and his mouth and throat burned as though full of smoke. Above the low hum of the unseen voices The Batman heard the roar of flame, the hissing, spitting and popping of burned dead things. His vision became hazy and as Pryzlak rose to his feet the image rippled as though The Batman were observing him through water.

"When you are ready." The killer informed him solemnly "You will know where to find me."

The Batman lay immobile. His skin bristling with agony, his body ravaged by unseen flames. His heart beat frenziedly, as if trying to smash its way through his ribcage to escape the agonising inferno that had consumed his body. Absently he heard Pryzlak's footsteps recede followed by the sound of a door opening and closing.

Almost instantly the sensation began to retreat. As Pryzlak's hateful presence absented itself the invisible flames that burned at The Batman smouldered and died. He lay there for over a minute, willing his heart to slow down, fighting to control his breathing.

His entire body ached, his head swam with pain, nausea and fatigue.

But he was The Batman.

And anything that did not kill him only made him stronger.

He rolled over onto his front, his muscles screaming in protest as he dragged himself to his knees. Too exhausted to stand he crawled to the body of the girl. Her chest rose and fell quickly. As he neared her he heard her breathing, ragged and shallow, and with a heavy heart he knew that she was beyond medical help.

He pulled her to him, wrapping his tattered cloak around her. Her skin was pale and clammy, her eyes glazed. Slowly she turned her gaze toward him.

"You are not the demon." She whispered.

"No." he replied, and in his gloveless hand he took hers, determined to at least bring some comfort to the poor girl's final moments.

"You're the one they call the Batman."

"Yes." He admitted. He struggled to find some words of consolation for this poor girl who was about to die as a result of his failure.

There were none.

I… I'm sorry." He offered, a tear welling in his eye.

The girl looked to be between eighteen and twenty, her hair auburn and her eyes a greenish grey. She was quite beautiful. On her face was a look of perfect serenity. Her smile radiated benevolence.

"I go to my God now. Do not pity me. I am glad of it. You needn't to stay with me."

Her eyes glazed over and shut dreamily. He tightened his grip on her hand.

"I won't leave you here with these monsters around."

"Monsters?!" Her eyes opened and she met his gaze sternly.

"They look like monsters to you?"

She read the confusion on the visible part of The Batman's face and she smiled a smile of infinite pity.

"Oh, Batman. Those you see as demons are angels trying to show you a path."

She reached up and gently touched his face.

"Let them!"

Pushing his confusion aside The Dark Knight held her until she drifted peacefully into an eternal sleep.

_At least_, he mused, _she died with a smile on her face_.

He remained there for an indeterminable amount of time with the dead girl cradled in his arms until he knew he could no longer delay his return to the killer's trail.

Gently, reverently, he set her down hoping earnestly that she had found the peace she seemed to believe in so fervently. He stood, looking down at her still body. She looked so beautifully serene. If it weren't for the blood that soiled her pristine white collar and cuffs and blackened her navy dress he would swear that she was soundly sleeping. He looked down at his bloodied hands, Pryzlak's words spoken in that demonic voice echoing in his head.

"_That is another death you have been powerless to prevent. I wonder how that makes you feel. Do you feel the rage burning inside you Brucie? The hatred?"_

The Batman's fists clenched. He felt it now. He had not felt it this strongly since he had stared, paralysed by fear and rage, into the eyes of his parents killer on that terrible night. The hatred bloomed inside him like a black rose, corrupting his fundamental goodness, filling his mind with dark and violent thoughts.

_All these years I've fooled myself into thinking that The Batman is about justice. The truth is far simpler._

A singular thought filled his mind.

_Batman is about vengeance. Plain and simple._

His first act as The Batman had been to declare war on all crime. Even then he had known that it was a fool's errand, hopelessly naïve, an odyssey that would doubtlessly claim his life.

_I made a promise on the grave of my murdered parents that I would one day rid Gotham City of the evil that took their lives. Now I have come to a place where that evil seems to have been granted physical form. An evil that has chosen Jason Pryzlak as its servant._

He knelt at the girl's side. Silently he made a promise over the body of the murdered girl just as he had on the grave of his parents. He promised that he would wreak revenge on Jason Pryzlak and the forces that controlled him.

_But how far_, he wondered, _am I willing to go? Am I prepared to cross a line that I drew for myself years ago?_

He searched inside himself for the answer, finding none. His critical faculties were veiled by anger, frustration and sadness.

_I will do whatever it takes. He resolved._

He bid a soundless farewell to the kind, murdered girl and rose, eager to return to the monster that had brought this torment upon him.

Behind him he heard a quiet but unmistakable sound. The click of a gun's hammer being pulled back.

The Batman tensed.

"Freeze!" an unseen voice commanded.


	11. Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10

The Dark Knight dropped to a crouch, grateful that the owner of the gun was courteous enough to demand that he freeze.

Almost instantly the owner of the voice and the gun opened fire. The cannon like boom of the gunfire deafening in the silent school corridor. The Batman pitched himself into a forward roll as sickly lumps of damp plaster rained down upon him.

Raising a gauntlet, and wrapping the shredded remains of his cloak around himself in defence The Batman appraised his attacker.

He wore the black and pale blue police uniform of a borough The Batman did not recognise. His stance and the way he held the gun implied extensive weapons training but the erratic and twitchy manner with which he fired showed that he was terrified, lost, bewildered.

_Welcome to Silent Hill_, the dark vigilante grinned mirthlessly to himself.

Three neat holes tore the flooring into splinters, inches from where The Batman crouched.

Beneath the folds of his cloak his hand hovered over the panel in his utility belt for batarangs.

_Only three left. Better retrieve this one if I can._

He twisted his crouched form into a throwing position as a bullet whizzed past within a half inch of his skull. Using as much strength as he could muster he hurled the projectile at his attackers gun hand.

The metallic clang and yowl of pain told The Dark Knight that his weapon had found its mark.

Wasting no time in looking after his fallen side arm, the maddened police officer instead reached in his holster for his baton, his bloodied forearm smearing his pale blue shirt.

_He's good. _

Whirling into a standing position The Batman flung back his cape and held out his hands palms outward at the officer, who snapped his weapon to full length with a flick of the wrist. Seeing the feral madness in the other man's eyes the vigilante attempted to reason with his attacker.

"Calm down, I'm not your-"

Before he could finish the sentence, his impetuous assailant was upon him, raining blows upon his weakened form with the baton. As he deflected the blows with his one damaged gauntlet The Batman was sure that he could hear his assailant whimpering;

"I won't let you. I won't. I won't!"

A downward strike penetrated his defence and caught The Batman's cranium, the sheer force sending him to his knees.

_This man's hysterical. Got to risk _hurting_ him!_

He brought his heel around in a circle, sweeping the policeman off his feet. He landed on his back, hard.

Seizing the moment The Batman pounced upon his fallen opponent, fist cocked to deliver the deciding blow.

"NO!"

The terror on the officer's face was all too plain but there was something else there too, a clarity in his eyes that suggested that his maddened state had passed.

"I didn't mean to… I'm sorry." He babbled, his chest heaving, his shirt blotchy with sweat and blood.

Taking a moment to catch his breath The Batman stood, his eyes locked on the other man. Confident that the threat had been neutralised he offered a hand to his opponent and helped him off the ground. He accepted it readily and stood for a moment, panting.

The policeman let out a nervous laugh. The sound was dry and brittle like crushed, dead twigs.

"I thought you were..."

Sternly The Batman nodded. It hadn't been the first time he had been mistaken for one of the deformed creatures that lurked in the shadows of this ghostly town.

"The name's Pete Steinberg. Brahams P.D."

He held out a shaking hand, a chunk of flesh had been gouged out by the batarang.

The Batman stood as silent and immobile as a statue.

"You're Batman, huh?"

Again, The Batman nodded slowly, sizing but this new acquaintance.

Steinberg was fairly tall and slender in build, similar in years to Bruce Wayne, The Batman guessed. His eyes were ringed by dark circles that told of many sleepless nights working on some case or other and deep worry lines were etched into his otherwise youthful looking face.

"You look different to how I thought."

It was true, The Batman's battle ravaged costume now had little of the psychological effect that he had intended it to. Still, it offered protection from the attacks of Silent Hill's unholy creatures, as well as adequately concealing his identity, he was grateful for both facets.

Steinberg did not _seem_openly hostile but his earlier demeanour suggested that he might be a liability if The Batman allowed him to accompany him. On the other hand, he had seen very few "normal" people since his arrival into Silent Hill and whatever macabre surprises the town had in store for him it might prove useful to face them with an ally. Besides which, as an officer of the law, Steinberg may have been privy to information that would be useful in apprehending Pryzlak.

Steinberg's attention was drawn to the slumped form of the murdered girl, a few yards down the corridor. Her dress was stained black and her face had become pale with blood loss. Despite this, her face was a perfect mask of serenity, eyes closed, mouth forever locked in a smile of contentment. The policeman knelt next to her body, his head bowed reverently.

"You were too late to help her," The Dark Knight growled at Steinberg, "We both were. Pryzlak got to her just before I arrived."

"Prizz- what?" Steinberg frowned up at the black clad detective.

"Jason Pryzlak." He answered, "A serial murderer from Silent Hill. I apprehended him in the middle of a string of murders in Gotham. I traced him back here."

"Don't know nothin' about that." The policeman replied, his eyes still fixated on the girl, "I only came over fro m Brahms on a day transfer. Got staffing problems over there, I'm told. Four hours ago I got called out to a domestic disturbance. Got to the address, knocked on the door. Wasn't nobody there. Went to get in my car, the engine completely locked up. That's when that damned fog came from out of nowhere. I was walking back to the station when I heard the scream. Must've been this little lady."

Steinberg rose and faced The Batman.

"And you say you were on the trail of the sick bastard that did this?"

Tersely the vigilante nodded.

"Alright then." Steinberg crossed the corridor and stooped to retrieve his fallen gun. Taking another few paces he reached up for the batarang which was imbedded in the far wall. He handed the weapon back to its owner.

"Look Batman, I don't know for sure what's going on here. The fog, the killings. People who shouldn't-"

Steinberg's head twitched slightly mid sentence. There was something strangely unsettling about the nervous tic.

"I mean, _things_ that… shouldn't exist roaming about the streets. It's all too much for me. But what I do know is that this little lady died on my watch and I take that kinda personal. So, what I mean is. I want to help in any way I can."

With only the slightest moment's reluctance The Batman collected his batarang.

"Can you get into the Silent Hill Police Department's database?" he asked.

"Database?" chortled Steinberg, "Shit, you'd be lucky to find a fax machine in that dump. SHPD ain't the most modernised precinct. In fact I'll be damned if I've even seen a computer in there. Still store all their files t'old fashioned way."

The Dark Knight's mouth tightened into what could be construed as a grimace or a smile.

"Then I'll have to break into their system the old fashioned way."

He turned on his heels, his cloak flourishing dramatically behind him as he went. Steinberg trotted dutifully alongside him.

"You can escort me to the police station. They'll have information that might be useful."

The Batman whirled around and brought his face little more than an inch in front of Steinberg.

"Just don't get in my way. If we run into Pryzlak, _you_ follow _my_ lead."

Batman felt a twinge of guilt at the menace of this precaution but it was for the policeman's own protection. And there was something about the wiry police officer that aroused suspicion and even disdain in the detective. Steinberg seemed affable and earnest enough but there was something in his agitated demeanour that seemed potentially dangerous. His instincts told him that the policeman was concealing _something_ from him.

If Steinberg was intimidated he did not show it. Unflinching he replied.

"Well how about we say you do what _you_ got to do, I'll do what _I_ got to do."

There was something unwholesome in his capped tooth smile.


	12. Chapter 11

CHAPTER 11

The main entrance had been locked. Despite the two men's combined efforts to force the door open, the heavy oak had not budged in its sturdy frame.

It had been Steinberg's idea to search the school's office for a key. The office door was also locked but allowed access through a window of dust frosted glass. With the butt of his revolver, Steinberg smashed open an entrance for the unlikely duo.

Hauling himself through the jagged opening, The Dark Knight surveyed the small, cramped, shadowy space. A thick layer of dust covered the desks and filing cabinets, peppered with flakes of dried paint. The walls were pocked with damp, mouldy patches, the paint blistered and cracked.

_A fairly typical example of Silent Hill chi__c_, The Batman mused. Steinberg's assessment was equally succinct.

"What a shithole!"

Together they rummaged through drawers and cabinets. Some contained little more than stacks of textbooks and class registers, others were empty. Some simply refused to open, regardless of how much force was applied.

The Dark Knight focused his attention on the chief administrator's desk. The usual stacks of paperwork were seen there as well as an unaccountable bottle of brown liquid. He had seen an identical bottle in the tunnel beneath the Balkan church. He picked it up, his detective's curiosity piqued. It's time yellowed label said simply, "DRINK ME.

"Doesn't look like anyone's been here in years, let alone yesterday." Remarked Steinberg, who was casually tossing books, files and ornamental curios from some shelves lining the wall.

While giving the papers on the desk a cursory inspection something caught The Dark Knight's eye.

It couldn't be.

His own name was written on one of the documents.

Furtively glancing over to make sure that Steinberg's attention was otherwise occupied The Batman snatched up the document. Instantly he recognised his old boarding school's crest on the letter head. It said in imposing gothic lettering.

SAINT MICHAEL'S SCHOOL FOR THE SONS OF GENTLEMEN

ROOKWOOD, OUTER GOTHAM

RE: PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT. WAYNE, B.

_Who put this here? Pryzlak? How the Hell did he get hold of this?_

The enraged detective read on;

Dear Mr Reinhardt,

I am writing to keep you abreast of the psychological condition of your pupil, one Bruce Wayne. While I agree that the changes in his behaviour are marked I do not think that concerns for his short or long term health are warranted. I thank you for bringing the boy's case to my attention.

Please find attached my psychological assessment in its entirety.

…

The Dark Knight skimmed over the next few pages. His shock addled mind absorbing snippets of information.

… manifestations of psychological trauma that are highly uncharacteristic of juvenile parental bereavement. Having liaised with school counselling and teaching staff, young Master Wayne's grief appears to have been subliminated into his academic and extra curricular activities.

…

While Bruce does not appear to have been a particularly gifted athlete nor a great academic, prior to his parents death, his recent attainments are little short of remarkable. His grades have risen dramatically from consistent Cs and Ds to uniform A+ grades. Bruce has also begun to excel in track and field exercises and gymnastics. Interestingly he has shown little enthusiasm for sports. He has signed up for extra curricular classes in fencing, judo and archery and excelled in a very short period of time.

…

Bruce's standard of academic work has risen meteorically with chemistry and philosophy emerging as areas of particular strength.

…

The spells of aggressive and antisocial behaviour have passed. After some brutal assaults upon pupils who have been identified as notorious bullies young Bruce seems to have channelled his grief into far more productive pursuits than blindly lashing out.

…

For all its positive effect on his intellectual prowess the incident appears to have left young Bruce somewhat socially malformed. Interactions with him reveal him to be very polite and articulate but seemingly uncomfortable with social interaction. It is suggested that-

"Hey, look at this." Steinberg called out.

The Batman quickly folded up the document and hurriedly stuffed it into a compartment in his belt.

He went over to join Steinberg who was appraising a map of the school which stood framed on the wall.

"Maybe we can't find a key, but if we can get through to this courtyard here," his nicotine stained finger indicated an open area separating the school into two wings, "We can hop over the wall to get out of here."

He scanned the map. There were only two sets of double doors separating them from the courtyard. They would just have to pray that they were not locked.

"Let's go." The Batman acquiesced. He did not want to spend a moment longer in the school than he absolutely had to.

They managed to leave the office by unlocking the door from the inside and the two men jogged briskly back to the corridor. They had passed through a set of double doors and were just about to pass through the other set on the opposite side when Steinberg froze.

"Did you hear that?"

The Batman tensed, his ears straining to hear anything in the blanket silence of the deserted school. After a few moments he heard it. The heaving, gurgling, choking sound of-

"Sounds like a kid crying." Steinberg asserted.

Quietly, stealthily the pair trod toward the source of the noise. They edged down the corridor, coming to a small, thin door. The silver disc on the door indicated that this was the boys' toilet.

The pair paused outside the door. The sound persisted. The crying sound escalated to a distressed wail.

Without hesitation the pair burst into the toilet. It was a small, cramped affair. Sinks and urinals were the greyish white of old bones. The piping and tiles were leprous with mildew and rust. There were three stalls, the nearest two hung open on rusted hinges, the third was shut.

It was from the third that the sound persisted.

"I'd better go first." Whispered Steinberg over the unseen child's sobbing, "No offence but it might freak the kid out seeing Batman open the door. God knows what he's seen already in this place."

The Batman nodded his consent. As Steinberg edged toward the occupied stall Batman caught sight of his reflection in the scabrous, rust pocked mirror.

He was barely recognisable. His secondary, bandana mask was nicked and torn in places, tufts of raven black hair poking through the tears. His cape hung in ragged tatters about his shoulders. His armour was scuffed and gashed, the most part of his insignia had been eaten away by the freakish maggot creatures. One hand was completely bare, the other was gloved but his gauntlet was battered and scorched with small, finger tip sized holes.

Steinberg flung the stall open. The Batman tensed. Neither man was expecting the sight that lay on the other side of the door.

Steinberg at first stood dumbfounded and then let out his nervous, broken twig laugh. The Batman crept over to join him, equally dumbfounded.

The stall was empty.

Steinbeck slapped his dark companion playfully on the shoulder.

"Damn, man. This place got us jumpin' at shadows. Hearing things, seeing things. Gonna drive me batshit insane." He winked at The Batman, "No offence."

He stepped into the stall and sat on the seatless toilet bowl, nervously scratching at his nose, teeth exposed in a nervous grin.

"Goddamn. You know Batman," he addressed The Dark Knight earnestly, "when I saw you in the corridor back there I thought you were-"

The door slammed shut.

The whole stall began to shake violently and a surprised whimper from the police officer trapped inside, soon gave way to a piercing shriek of agony. The Batman threw himself at the door but an unseen force sent him crashing into the sink opposite.

As the vigilante rose to his feet the violent shaking stopped.

"Steinberg?" he hissed.

He took two tentative steps towards the stall.

There was neither a sound nor the slightest movement. Gingerly his gloved hand tapped at the door. It swung open to reveal a gut wrenching scene of brutality.

Pete Steinberg had been eviscerated. He hung, upside down, suspended by barbed wire that appeared to originate from inside the bowl. A steaming pile of organs and viscera lay in front of the toilet. The Batman could not bring himself to look down at his murdered companion's face. Instead his eyes were drawn to the message daubed on the blood streaked tile of the wall. In large, crude, childish letters a word had been smeared on the wall.

MURDERER

The Batman's fists clenched and his snarling lip curled over his teeth.

Right on cue the blare of the siren rattled the decaying walls of Midwich Elementary School.


	13. Chapter 12

_**A Note From The Author-**_

_**My sincerest apologies to the readers (dare I even say… fans?) of this literary endeavour for the disgustingly long time between this and my last chapter. The reason for this, other than the usual gripes about free time, is because I have, this year, gotten married. As a result I've found it quite difficult to find that dark place that's necessary to really enter into the spirit of Silent Hill. I hope this action packed chapter makes up for it.**_

MURDERER!

The image seemed to stare accusingly at The Batman even as the wall tiles around it receded, crumbled and fell apart like burnt paper.

MURDERER!

The word remained, daubed in what looked like dried blood, now no less stark against a background of rust pocked sheet metal.

MURDERER

Turning on his heel he darted, enraged, out of the cubicle, slamming the bathroom door wide open with a shove as the siren's mournful wail blared in his ears and rattled the rusty iron panes and chain link that had replaced the walls.

The Batman stalked along the barely lit corridor, registering the change in his surroundings without breaking stride. Only a wan light, hovering in the centre of the corridor, alleviated the inky blackness. His senses alert, his nerves steeled, he crept forward carefully, alert to an attack from within the dark confines of the corridor.

The journey seemed to take hours.

The siren's blare had now faded, leaving an oppressive silence to fall over the school. The dark knight's boots trod warily, his footfalls practically inaudible.

In the darkness the shadows seemed to pulse and crawl sluggishly, pregnant with the threat of hidden hellish things with malevolent thoughts. Murderous creatures with rotted brown skin stretched tightly over glistening sinew. Dark things with venomous teeth and claws that vomited flesh eating pink maggots. Chiding himself for entertaining such paranoid fantasies, Batman retraced his steps back to the main corridor, reprising his plan to escape the school by scaling the courtyard wall.

MURDERER

The word lingered, mockingly in his mind, as persistent and irritating as the ringing that pervaded in his ears in wake of the siren. The accusation conjured up a sickening combination of revulsion, anger and fear in the pit of his stomach. The Batman's justice was a dark justice, a brutal justice, built upon fear, intimidation and violent revenge.

But he had never murdered anybody.

Were the malevolent forces behind this nightmarish town preying on his sense of guilt at all those innocent lives he had failed to save over the years? Was that why it had tormented him with the ghastly image of a burning Jason Todd? Had the deaths of the unidentified schoolgirl and the police officer, Steinberg been orchestrated somehow to play on his conscience? Or was there-

_"If thine eye offends thee, little Brucie, pluck it out!"_

-some other, hidden truth behind the message? The possibility plagued him as he crept, silently, towards the floating light. The glare of the light, soon became dazzling in the pitch black and The Batman fancied he noticed something moist glistening in the light as he got closer.

Now blinded by the light he reached out his gloveless left hand to steady himself. It came into contact with something solid. And warm. And wet. He withdrew it in revulsion. With his other hand he reached toward the source of the light, his fingertips brushing the familiar, cylindrical shape of a flashlight. He tugged at the barrel and it came away from its housing with a hollow, scraping sound. In its stark glow he saw a thick film of crimson, blackish ichor on his bare fingers where they had made contact with the repulsive form in front of him.

Swinging the flashlight's beam in front of him he beheld a sight that nauseated and offended him, not least for the fact that it should not have logically existed.

Where, only moments before there had been an unobstructed length of corridor, there now stood a solid wall constructed from a mishmash of rusted iron bars and chains. Yet it was the centrepiece of this inexplicable wall that aroused such utter horror in the veteran crime fighter.

A skinned and eviscerated human corpse hung cruciform in the centre of the wall, it's legs and arms twitching feebly against the thick chains that held it in place, piercing the flesh of the wrists and ankles. Its face was frozen in an open mouth gasp of shock and pain and it was with no small amount of revulsion that The Batman realised he had taken the flashlight from between the crooked, blackened teeth of its mouth. A slow stream of the bloody crimson ooze had begun to drip from its lipless mouth, splashing noisily into a puddle by his boots.

Its one remaining eye was lidless and stared fixedly at him in mocking accusation. Beside it was a hollow, shrunken socket.

_"If thine eye offends"_

The near total silence was punctured by a low, rasping, grating sound that made The Batman start. It was only when he traced the sound to its source that he realised it was in fact a rumble of static from the small radio he had found in the tunnel and attached to his belt.

Knowing that such a sound was the harbinger of an attack by the town's bizarre creatures, The Batman whirled around to face his unseen aggressors, bringing the flashlight around in a wide arc that swept across the corridor. The sight that greeted them made his blood run cold.

There were at least a dozen of them, their thick, squat bodies standing shoulder to shoulder, filling the corridor with their powerful bulk. They were headless but for a quivering tumorous growth between their square muscular shoulders. In the beam of the flashlight their glistening skin appeared the sickly greyish brown colour of bad meat. Their arms were long and heavily muscled, reaching nearly all the way to the ground and ending in a trio of razor sharp, bony claws.

They emitted a curious, porcine snuffling noise that was audible over the crackle of the radio.

They stood, immobile, their jelly like protuberances twitching curiously. Without warning, as though by some shared consensus they began to slowly amble forward, forming an advancing wall of sickly flesh and jagged claws.

He tensed, bending slightly at the knees, distributing his weight evenly to allow him greater manoeuvrability, his mind assessing the options open to him in fight or flight. Avenues of escape seemed scant, with his back to the macabre spectacle of the wall. Slowly but inexorably the freakish horde advanced, forcing him into confrontation.

The radio's crackle had now developed into an acerbic screech and The Batman was sure that he could detect the faintest snatches of conversing voices amidst the static;

……………………… **Getting a pulse………………………… Just barely breathing………………Why?…. WHY?!?……… What is keeping that child alive?**

The nearest of the creatures was now within range, its lumbering gait lending impetus to its attack.

**It's alright Lisa….. Your Medicine…………..**

In a fluid movement The Batman freed two batarangs from his belt, snapping them open and clenching them tightly in his fists. As projectiles they would be useless at this range, but he had designed them with a variety of purposes in mind.

**Its very interesting, Dr Kaufman………………how quickly…………patient……… addictive properties of White Claudia……………………………**

The Batman blinked.

_I know that voice!_

Before he could ponder any further the creature lunged, its wickedly sharp claws threatening to pierce his armour and rend his flesh. He parried the claw with the sharp edge of the batarang and darted quickly to his right, getting inside of the creature's attack range. Bringing his hands across in a powerful, scything notion he made two neat incisions in the creature's torso just above the quivering stump that substituted for its head. As expected, rivulets of dark, foul smelling blood began to surge from the wounds and along its torso. With a savage kick to its barrel chest he sent it careering into its peers, in a savage maelstrom of flailing muscular limbs and treacherous claws.

The Batman was no murderer, nor was he prepared to willingly take the lives of these creatures, malicious and abhorrent as they were. The defence had been intended to maim, disorient and enrage the beast. And it appeared to be working.

The wounded creature thrashed about savagely, its claws finding purchase in the vulnerable flesh of those around it. The frantically flailing claws sliced and stabbed at the creatures around it who in turn, simply lumbered toward Batman, seemingly oblivious. As it struggled to the heavy stumps that were its feet, the foremost monster neatly sliced off the head stump of the creature nearest to it, causing a geyser of maroon blood to erupt over the crowd of monsters before it crashed, gurgling to the ground, dead.

The creatures halted, as one.

The Batman whirled into a defensive crouch.

Several creatures snuffled and swayed, bathed in the blood of the decapitated monster. Soon the snuffling had been taken on by the entire group to create a strange, maddening buzzing sound that rang in Batman's ears and crept insidiously into his brain. His head felt spongy and light as if in the early stages of concussion, then without warning came blinding pain that would pall any migraine into mild annoyance.

He dropped to his knees, his weapons clattering to the ground. The buzzing in his head threatened to shatter his skull, his stomach seemed to roil with bile and acid.

The wounded lead creature let out a terrible, screeching roar that echoed in the slender corridor as though the door had been opened into a vast and brutal abattoir.

As one the creatures dove toward the kneeling Dark Knight, spurred on by a newfound sense of bloodlust.

His sharply honed instincts forced him to fight through the waves of pain and nausea. Pushing himself to his feet he reached a hand up to the thick, immobile chains on the wall behind him and leaped, swinging his legs high in the air. Using all his strength to haul himself up he managed to perch himself near the rusted iron mesh roof.

Drawing his knees up to his chest placed him above the shoulder level of the surging wave of creatures, but not beyond the reach of their slashing claws. One raked across his calf, easily searing through his armoured boot. Ignoring the flare of pain he fished his free hand into a compartment in his belt, producing his remaining handful of gas pellets. A weapon designed with an intimidating flash-bang activation meant to stun and disorientate large groups of assailants.

While he had little faith in the gas' ability to incapacitate them, the flash and bang caused by igniting them all in close proximity to each other might confuse them long enough for him to plan an escape.

He flung the pellets on the ground, curling himself up into a ball on his perch, braced against the small explosion.

There was the briefest flash and a loud bang that rattled the chains that kept him from the ground and The Batman seized his moment.

Kicking off against the wall, he dived into the throng of leathery, misshapen bodies, scrambling across their broad shoulders as the corridor began to flood with thick brown smog. Claws lashed up at him, scraping across his armour with small showers of sparks, slicing off ribbons of his already tattered black cape that fell, fluttering to the ground like dying crows.

The slow-witted creatures were unable to react to this new threat from above quickly enough. As his boot came to bear on the jelly like head stump of one creatures head stump with a sickening squelch, Batman launched himself bodily into the nearest doorway.

As the door swung shut he threw his back against it, braced against the inevitable onslaught of scraping claws and thumping meaty hands. He could have wept at the sight that awaited him.

He had thrown himself right back into the bathroom he had just left from.

In his frenzied abandon he had not stopped to consider which door he leap through so long as it left the dreadful corridor.

It seemed that that lack of foresight would seal his fate.

The claw that drove a splintering hole through the door, millimetres from his left ear reminded him that survival allowed little time for pessimism. Sliding away from the door he drew himself up to his full height, a new pair of batarangs at the ready, ready to face whatever came through that door, even if it cost him his life.

Seconds later another trio of claws had begun carving huge chunks of splintered wood from the door. There was scant time before they had created a hole big enough for their short, stocky bodies to crawl through.

_Here's Johnny!_ The Batman thought grimly.

He took several paces back to draw level with the sink that dripped its murky brown water all over the filthy linoleum floor. Determined to make every second count he made a mental inventory of the items in his belt, fighting back the urge to acknowledge the cubicle to his left that held Steinberg's mutilated body.

_First aid kit._

_Taser._

_**Taser**!_

His eyes darted to the dripping sink at his right.

Bringing his foot up high he braced himself to give the grubby porcelain a mighty kick.

By the time the first twitching head stump had poked its way through the ragged hole in the door The Batman had wrenched the sink from the wall and a steady spray of stagnant water burst from the pipes. As the door was reduced to shattered chunks of wood, a wave of blood tainted filthy water oozed over the filth encrusted floor tiles, toward The Dark Knight's aggressors.

There were four of them, all covered in the lacerations from each other's flailing attacks. Behind them Batman noticed, with some satisfaction that the gas had indeed affected the rest of their creatures and their slumbering bodies now littered the corridor.

Wrenching the taser from his belt he leapt nimbly atop the nearest remaining sink, training the short-range weapon on his advancing foes. He waited patiently for their grotesque forms to shamble within range. Slowly, languidly the nearest began to cock back its bulbous hand, preparing to bring the claws around in a deadly arc. Their head stumps jiggling excitedly, the others began to follow suit. The water lapping around their feet was now approaching ankle level. The time was now.

The Batman depressed the taser's trigger, shooting the pronged barb into the floor tile by the lead monster's feet with a dull crack. Before the creatures could begin their murderous assault, a charge of over a hundred thousand volts surges through the water and into the deformed attackers' bodies. With a shower of sparks and a brief flash of light the creatures stiffened, juddered and collapsed in a smoking pile of rotten flesh coloured meat.

Allowing himself a moment to savour his victory The Batman let out a long, deep sigh and slumped against the rusty wall of the bathroom before wrenching the barb from the cracked tile and promptly leaving the bathroom.

Rejuvenated somewhat by this latest in a series of narrow escapes he renewed his search for an exit with renewed vigour. He would explore the rest of the corridor, heading away from the gutted corpse, and see what other options presented themselves.

Rounding the corner he froze.

A black shape stood before him, impossibly tall and intimidating. It was dressed in a moth eaten hat and trench coat and where one of its hands should be, a dripping bloodied stump housed the enormous barrel of a cannon sized gun.

It was an exaggerated and twisted parody of the image of his parents' killer.

The Tormentor from his nightmares had returned.


	14. Chapter 13

CHAPTER 13

Spent, exhausted, on the verge of collapse The Batman drew himself to his full height as the Tormentor strode, unhurriedly towards him, its vast bulk leaving little room for evasion in the oppressively cramped, rust pocked corridor.

"Whatever you are. I'm not afraid of you!" he lied, assuming a fighting stance, one hand hovering by the compartment of batarangs in his belt. The rasping bass of The Batman's voice was gone now, leaving in its stead a voice that sounded weak and alien to him.

The huge creature advanced, its gun arm rising slowly. He dragged himself forward on leaden feet to meet the challenge or die trying. Bruce remembered the last time he fought the creature. How ineffectual his attacks had been, how utterly helpless it had made him feel.

Bruce? **No!** He was The Batman; he was not some pampered milksop, but-

With a hollow crack the creature's gun discharged and for a few seconds Bruce knew only pain and the coppery taste of his own blood. He lay face down on the corridor's grimy floor sucking in ragged breaths of dust filled air. The creature had shot him in his moment of exhausted self-doubt.

His ears rang and dripped blood, his cracked ribs sang with agony. His breath was shallow and weak. He was seriously injured but intact. The armour had taken the worst of the damage. All about him were scattered fragments of sculpted black armour, the smouldering, shattered remains of his emblem.

The last vestiges of The Batman persona had been robbed of Bruce.

He made a brief, pitiful attempt to rise but a thousand barbs of pain scythed through his torso, pinning him to the ground.

Still the Tormentor advanced, the smoking barrel lodged in its stump cocked for a second attack. The phantom presence that had stalked his nightmares for over twenty years stood over Bruce. The amorphous shadowy creature that had murdered his parents had finally come to claim him.

_No! My parents were murdered by Joe Chill. Joe Chill! Not a phantom, but a man of flesh and blood._

Bruce, The Batman dragged himself, slowly, agonisingly to his feet, chunks of shattered, useless armour falling off him as he rose. He would not let himself be mystified by this town, by these creatures. He would happily die in battle before letting himself become-

_Little Brucie_

-Cowed by the forces of Silent Hill. With a defiant roar he lunged at the Tormentor, letting rage dull the agony if only for a second. The creature swiped dismissively at Bruce, batting him aside and sending him slamming into the scabrous wall.

Bruce collapsed, broken. He spat out a bloody, shuddering breath. His final act of defiance. Then he closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable.

The creature's footsteps were a slow, rhythmic bass drum echoing through the rusty iron cage of the corridor. A funeral march.

Through the fog of pain and exhaustion Bruce fancied he heard the low wail of that dreaded siren echo in the corridor. The dirge of Silent Hill singing out to celebrate his passing!

* * *

**Mommy….**

**I… I heard the doctors.**

**They said you're in a lot of pain.**

_

* * *

_

_Darkness._

_Darkness had been a friend and ally, comfort and solitude but now it was alien, cloying, frightening. Best to push away from it. Push toward the tan and crimson. Yes, there is pain there but you work through pain, remember?_

_Ah, and just beyond. Light!_

_**It hurts.**_

_I know! Whatever you do don't let the pain push you back into the darkness. Come through the crimson. There's light there! Just a little more-_

"- just a little more. You know I'm good for it!"

"This is not the time Lisa. Now go through and check on the patient. Our guest will be here any moment and I'd much rather you didn't embarrass me."

The voices were muffled but close. The first had been female, wavering, and the second aggressively male. He focused on them, used them to draw him into a state of consciousness. There was no crimson now, only white. White and the smell of disinfectant masking vomit, urine and bad food.

A hospital.

Sensation returned. First there was only pain. He sampled it, made a note of it and pushed through, stored it in the back of his mind, brought his focus to his surroundings. The room was a sickly fish belly greyish white, save for a few reddish brown smears where rust from bolts and joists had fought through the paint. Rust! Something about it aroused dread and sickness in him. What was the connotation?

"Oh…. You're awake?"

Fingertips grazed the skin of his face, leaving tingly patches of sensation in their wake. Tingling. The cotton wool feeling in his mouth. He had been drugged.

He was lying down, on his back. Was he in a bed?

A red blur blossomed in front of him, shone a pinprick of stabbing, harsh light into his eyes.

"Can you hear me?"

The voice was female and vaguely familiar. He tried to respond but his tongue was bloated and dry. He managed a grunt. The blur receded, leaving behind the scent of Chanel perfume over cigarette smoke.

"Good. Very good. You know you've come around a lot quicker than we might have expected Mr Wayne."

Panic and alarm flared in his mind but he didn't know why. Why was it wrong that she knew who he was? He tried to rise, met resistance.

"Oh, that's probably not a good idea!"

The blur returned and solidified. Assumed a vague, hazy semblance of a person. It leaned closer, that smell of perfume masking carcinogens again. He felt his head pulled forward gently, then lowered back onto newly plumped pillows. He swallowed dryly and tried again to speak.

"Whu… Hannnd?"

"What happened?"

"Yuh"

The blur was fully formed now. A young woman, a nurse. He took the measure of her as she eyed him nervously, blonde, slight and fair in complexion. He face was pretty but lined with fatigue and what looked like sadness. Dark rings encircled her eyes. Occupational hazard, no doubt. He pristinely starched uniform was bedecked with a blood red cardigan.

"You're in Alchemilla Hospital, in Silent Hill, Mr Wayne. You were in… ah… a car accident and we-

**Why? WHY? What is keeping that child alive?**

**-**miracle you came out of it was well as you did. A couple of cracked ribs, some minor head injuries-

**I can't stand it any more. Please… help me!**

-might have been more.. umm… appropriate to take you into Brookhaven but they decided it would be better for you to uh… recuperate here for the moment."

A car accident?

Yes. He remembered fighting a petrified steering wheel, veering wildly, white noise and pain. But there was something else. Forcing his will into each syllable he tried to speak.

"How do you know my name?"

The nurse flushed slightly.

"It's not quite as backward as everyone thinks round here. We still get the Enquirer! I mean, we don't get many celebrities around here. By the way, do you have anyone you'd like us to call?"

With the recollection, icy tendrils crept down Bruce's spine. He had come to the unassuming resort town of Silent Hill on then trail of a murderer. He had gone there as-

"Nurse?"

She smiled sheepishly,

"You can call me Lisa."

"Lisa?"

"Yes?"

"What was I… wearing when you brought me in?"

The smile vanished from her face. There was a spark of fear in those tired eyes.

"I'd… better get the doctor."

The nurse whirled around the corner and returned seconds later with an austerely handsome man of middle age. He fixed Bruce with a disapproving stare.

"Mr Wayne I'm Doctor Kaufman. I hope you don't mind but under the circumstances I've asked a visiting doctor to consult on your case. He should be here any moment"

The doctor drew closer and sat on the end of the bed. Bruce became aware of a buzzing sensation in his head. An acute sense of nausea.

" I need you to ask you if you remember anything at all about the circumstances surrounding your crash."

Shards of white hot pain tore through Bruce's head. The sterile white walls of the room seemed to roil and writhe, teeming with concealed horrors. The buzzing became an agonising blare that stung his ears. He was aware that the nurse, Lisa was close to him, her fingers at his jugular, speaking words to him that were inaudible over the buzzing. His heart began to beat frenziedly, uncontrollably. His limbs stiffened and contorted, his fingers locked into claws.

Kaufman looked down at him condescendingly.

"Oh dear."

With medical indifference he produced a syringe full of some unknown substance and jabbed it into Bruce's stiffened forearm. The buzzing dimmed to an annoying him. The nausea was stronger than ever but the pain had receded. The walls now simply pulsed and quaked slightly, their fury seemingly abated.

"Just a little concoction of my own devising to make you a little more co-operative, Mr Wayne."

Kaufman's voice was rich and mellifluous, a warm soothing sound that stayed the buzzing.

"You'll be glad to know the seizures will pass with time. Common withdrawal symptoms, I'm afraid."

"Withdrawal?"

"You wealthy, high society types and your designer drugs. I'm sorry to have to say this Mr Wayne but you've been an accident waiting to happen for a long time."

Bruce's head felt heavy, sluggish. His thoughts came slowly and hazily, as though he were looking at them through fog.

"Drugs?"

"Yes, I suppose I should resent that you chose Silent Hill as the venue for one of your decadent celebrity hallucinogen marathons but then from a professional point of view its been quite fascinating working with Dr Crane on this. His expertise in the field of psychopharmacology is truly-"

A flare of panic erupted in Bruce's mind, a tiny candle light barely visible through the fog.

"Scare… crow!" The word trickled out of his mouth involuntarily like drool. He had only the vaguest sense of what it meant.

"What was that? Lisa, would you prop Mr Wayne up for me please."

Lisa and her scent were beside him again and the world lurched violently upward. Invisible knives stabbed at his brain, the walls shuddered threateningly. His arms and legs were numb and leaden, appendages alien to him that he couldn't operate even if he had the will. He could only stare groggily at the pale doctor.

"Mr Wayne I need to know how long you've been using PTV!"

Bruce suddenly became sure that if he didn't answer the doctor immediately then the wave of pain and nausea would return. The walls would once again squirm as if teeming with maggots. But he could not answer a question he didn't understand.

"Whu…. What's pee tee…"

"Oh my word you are far gone, aren't you?" Kaufman admonished. "Would you excuse me, Mr Wayne?"

The doctor turned on his heel and briskly swept out of the tiny room. Lisa smiled weakly at him as if in apology for the pain that they both knew was coming. Almost the instant Kaufman left the room the buzzing resumed, even more intensely than before, it rattled in his eardrums like a prisoner raging against the bars of their cell. Incrementally it raised in pitch, became a wail. The grey white of the walls once again teemed with the thrashing of unseen horrors. It seemed to be cracking and peeling in places, rivulets of rust and dirt bleeding down from the ceiling.

Lisa bowed her head. Was she crying?

Kaufman re-entered the room, oblivious to the crackling scabs of paint, which fell leprously from the walls. He was accompanied by a tall, gaunt man with horn rimmed glasses and a thatch of unkempt straw coloured hair, speckled with grey.

"As you can see," sneered Kaufman to his guest, "He's already quite far gone. Classic symptoms of PTV withdrawal."

The newcomer nodded sagely and roughly gripped Bruce by the head, claw like fingers digging into the flesh of his cheeks. He regarded him with a piercing stare, his eyes amber and owl like.

"Scaaaare…rroow." Once again the word came to him unbidden through shuddering lips.

Bruce began to quake uncontrollably, the noise was almost deafening. All about him something thick and tarry oozed through cracks in the paint. Rust the colour of dried blood. Neither of the doctors seemed phased in the least by the transformation.

The skeletal doctor clucked his tongue.

"Uh huh, and this is the substance derived from the plant known as White Claudia, correct? Yes, I've been using similar plant based hallucinogens in my experiments. When was the patient admitted?"

"Six hours ago, Dr Crane." replied Kaufman, "Woman walking her dogs found him crawling out of a wrecked Lamborghini. Scared the poor woman half to death all that blood!"

"And the delusional behaviour?"

Kaufman eyed Bruce contemptuously,

"Yes, that's the one inconsistency with the usual symptoms of PTV withdrawal, but when we first got him Mr Wayne was raving quite insistently at us, and anyone else within earshot until we got him sedated. You see, Mr Wayne here appears to think that he's the Batman and that he came here chasing a murderer named Jason Pryzlak."

Crane's brow furrowed.

"I've never heard of a Jason Pryzlak."

Kaufman chuckled.

"I'd be very surprised if you had. He's the goddamn _janitor_!"


	15. Chapter 14

CHAPTER 14

Consciousness ebbed and flowed.

Every now and then the doctors would look in on Bruce. The austerely handsome Doctor Kaufmann, the avian featured Doctor Crane. Needles and tubes came and went. Sometimes a wet slopping sound lurched into his dreams and he would turn his head to see the janitor dutifully mopping. He gave Bruce a brown toothed smile.

"Recognise me?"

Bruce shook his head. The janitor laughed. His breath smelled like spoiled meat being barbecued.

"Sleep well, little Brucie!"

And he was gone.

Sometimes Lisa would sing to him as she changed his dressings. Her hands were cold and dainty like porcelain.

"Maybe I didn't love you quite as often as I could have"

The shadows sometimes bled from their natural hiding places but they quickly receded and the walls no longer pulsed or shuddered.

"And maybe I didn't treat you quite as good as I should have"

Day by day the colour drained from the world. Outside the window a mist hovered serenely above the ground.

"If I made you feel second best… I'm so sorry, I was blind."

Sometimes Lisa would put the radio on for him.

"You were always on my mind."

But the radio always sounded like Lisa's voice.

"You were always on my mind."

Awake.

Bruce breathed in deeply. The smell of blood and faeces masked by harsh chemical disinfectant. A hospital smell.

Someone had been messing with the radio and the music had been replaced with a droning hiss of white noise. He slid his legs out of the bed. The nausea caused by the movement was mercifully fleeting. He rose shakily and dressed himself. His clothes had been laid out for him, a pair of charcoal slacks, a black shirt comfortable brown loafers and a grey overcoat. Alfred must have come to visit, laid out his clothes for him. This hadn't been what he was wearing-

**Sharpstabbingpain**

-when he was admitted had it?

Where was Alfred? Perhaps at the machine getting a cup of tea.

Joints accustomed to inertia creaked and cracked as he limped over to the window. The mist completely covered the grounds but its presence was soothing to him. He no longer minded it. Why had he ever minded it?

Steadying himself against the wall he made his way down the corridor. Silence blanketed the hospital, disrupted only by the shuffling of his feet.

Where was everybody?  
"Hello? Alfred?"

He had enjoyed his stay in Silent Hill, perhaps partied a little too hard (certainly should have lain off the 'Claudia) but now he was ready to get back to Gotham. How long had he been gone? It didn't matter; Wayne Enterprises would have managed without him. Lucius had his back.

"Doctor Kaufmann?"

It was snowing outside. Somewhere a church bell was ringing.

"Lisa?"

There was a funny taste in his mouth. A feeling that something in his stomach was scratching and clawing to get out. Damn concussion.

He reached the duty nurse's desk and fun it abandoned. A coffee cup with a greyish collar of mouldy fur. A glass cross section model of a human eye-

"**If thine eye offends thee, little Brucie"**

-On top of a stack of card folders a new file marked 'Wayne, Bruce'. He picked it up only to find it empty. Weird. Maybe the doctors were discussing his notes. He made his way through the deserted corridors trying to find Kaufmann's office. It didn't take him long to find the door marked 'Dr M Kaufmann' leaning slightly ajar. He knocked politely and it swung open.

"Doc?"

The office was empty. Bruce glanced over the loosely assembled stack of papers but saw no mention of his name. Maybe he should wait for the doctor. Aside from the nausea he felt like he was well enough to discharge himself but it was always nice to do things the proper way. He sat patiently and scanned the books lining the shelf. It was a fairly typical compendium of medical texts; Bruce had never been a particularly big reader so they held little interest for him. He did spy a few texts written by the good doctor as well as an impressive leather bound volume entitled "Shaping Mind and Body: A Medical Guide to Psychopharmacology by Professor Jonathan Crane. He flicked through understanding little. Who needs brains when you've got billions?

There was a jar filled with a curious crimson liquid. At first Bruce assumed that it was blood but then he noticed the crystallisation around the edges and turned it over in his hand. A faded yellow label read 'Aglaophotis'.

Bruce returned to his chair and watched the snow fall through the window. The gentle chiming of the church bell was like a lullaby and Bruce was about to drift off when he heard the sounds of a scuffle, muffled curses and the slamming of a door.

He returned to the corridor but saw no one. He peered through the reinforced glass portholes in each door, looking for signs of a new patient. The first few he tried were empty. A sudden sound made him start.

A familiar male voice, singing.

"If I made you feel second best… I'm so sorry, I was blind."

The song from the radio. The last time he had heard it had sounded like Lisa's voice but this sounded like… No, it couldn't be!

"You were always on my mind."

He followed the sound and peered through the viewing window.

"You were always on my mind."

A familiar figure sat on an unmade hospital bed. Half his face in shadow. Bruce swallowed hard.

"Harvey?"

His friend inclined his head slightly toward him and smiled sardonically. His hands and feet were manacled. He wore only a hospital gown.

"Hello Bruce."

District Attorney Harvey Dent was one of Bruce's closest friends but what the Hell was he doing here?

"They think I'm sick." Harvey barked a mirthless laugh in answer to his unspoken question.

"They tied me up," he indicated his hands, "Even took my father's lucky coin. Sons of bitches."

Something wasn't right. Not right at all. Bruce felt a cold bead of sweat slide down the nape of his neck. The chiming of the bells had turned into something else. A sound he couldn't quite identify.

"They're going to kill you, Bruce. You know that don't you?"

There was a menace to his friend's voice that sounded alien to Bruce.

"You deserve to die Bruce. And you deserve to suffer."

He knew what the sound was now. It was in the corridor and in the walls and in his head.

An air raid siren.

"The things you did, you bastard!"

Bruce's mouth chewed air, tried to find the right words.

"No, Harvey, it'll be alright," he fumbled at the handle but the door did not budge, "I'm going to get you out of here."

"Alright?" a voice that did not belong to Harvey Dent laughed, "**Nothing's ****ever**** going to be alright Bruce. LOOK AT ME!**"

He turned to face the light and Bruce reeled back in horror. Half of Harvey's face was skinless and necrotic, maggots writhing in oozing pus. A lidless eye stared balefully at him.

"**You did this to me. YOU DID THIS YOU BASTARD!"**

All around him the walls were rotting, crumbling way from iron and rust and blood.

Bruce tried to run but his legs betrayed him. He pitched forward and fell into the arms of Doctor Crane.

"Doc," Bruce clawed at the doctor's lab coat. "Doc, you've got to help me. That man in there, he wants to kill me."

Crane smiled.

"Patient suffers from paranoid schizophrenic delusions."

The lab coat fell away in Bruce's hand, a tattered grey rag. Crane's smile darkened and teeth metamorphosed into coarse dark stitching. Skin became burlap. Bruce kicked away, scrambling desperately on the floor.

"Behaviour is marked by an extreme persecution complex."

The doctor's voice echoed from within the walls. The siren seemed to throb in Bruce's skull. Where Crane had once stood there rose a giant spindly figure, wielding a rusty but lethally sharp scythe.

"Doubtlessly resulting from a deeply suppressed guilt."

Pain and fear rooted Bruce to the stop. All he could do was stare numbly in terror as the giant… Scarecrow loomed over him, scythe raised.

"My suggested course of treatment… Test response to extreme stimuli"

The scythe came whistling down and Bruce threw his weight backwards as it buried itself in the floor. The floor bled a foul smelling ichor.

Bruce scrambled to his feet and threw himself at the door. It was rusted shut. His shaking hands pumped the handle. The Scarecrow advanced.

"Followed by a prolonged course of electro shock therapy."

The scythe plunged into the door and a surge of sparks coursed through Bruce, knocking him to the floor. He crawled as fast as he could on scorched hands, the scythe arcing behind him, missing him by a hair.

"I'm afraid the prognosis is not good, Mister Wayne."

The pain in Bruce's hands became too much and he collapsed to the ground. He began to sob. He held up his blistered palms.

"Please, I don't want to die."

Laughter echoed along the corridor but it was neither the laughter of the Scarecrow or Harvey Dent locked away in his hospital room.

Shivering, Bruce turned to see a hunched figure standing behind him, between him and a pair of eroded elevator doors which slid, gratingly open.

"Come now, little Brucie. Our game isn't over already is it?"

The scythe came up.

Bruce recognised the man who stood between him and the elevator. A man who spoke with the voice of a little girl. The janitor.

Bruce spoke in a voice that was not his own.  
"Pryzlak!"

Something lurched inside Bruce, pounding with a sickening crack against his ribcage. He doubled up in agony, his eyes screwed shut.

Coughed blood.

The Scarecrow hesitated, its weapon hovering, ready to strike.

The creature awakened inside Bruce, sucked in air and bared its fangs in a smile of victory. It spread its wings and threw itself with splintering force against its prison walls of bone and meat. The pain jolted Bruce to his knees. He clutched his chest and tore open his shirt. On his bare skin a mottled bruise.

A bruise in the shape of a bat.

"Aaaah," the voice behind him said, "There you are!"

The windows exploded, showering the three figures in broken glass. A dark cascade of fluttering, dark figures flooded the corridor, their high pitched squeals combined to make a deafening roar.

Bats.

Bruce drew himself to his feet. Wiped blood from his mouth. Smiled.

"I see now. I see what you tried to do."

The fluttering creatures formed a dark tornado around Bruce, their bodies black and shimmering like tar.

The Scarecrow lowered his scythe. "No, it can't be. You were broken."

Bruce's eyes snapped open.

"You tried to feed on my pain... My fear. But I became fear long ago."

The bats converged upon him in a vortex of wings and fangs, their glistening bodies splattering on impact. They became amorphous, liquid and crawled along his body. They hardened and formed gloves, boots, armour, a horned mask.

"You thought The Batman was something that could be stripped from me."

The Scarecrow roared in anger and charged at him, scythe raised. Batman stood impassive. The scythe shattered into fragments of cinder against his armour.

"Silent Hill. They were right; the Old Gods haven't left this place."

Batman's gloved fist shot out, connecting with the Scarecrow's jaw.

The apparition exploded in a flurry of burlap fibres. Batman wheeled around to face Pryzlak.

"But you were wrong to think that they work for you!"

The Scarecrow was gone and the walls were once again made of plaster and paper. Pryzlak leaned against the elevator doors and gave the Batman a slow hand.

"Good. Very good. You know, you've almost got it. Just a tiny shift in perspective and you'd see." the killer now spoke in his own voice. He nodded at Batman's feet, "You going to pick that up?"

Where the Scarecrow had stood there lay a single sheet of letter paper. He had seen others like it before. Whoever was pulling the strings of the unseen forces at work in Silent Hill had been feeding him his own unsent letters to his dead father.  
Batman picked up the piece of paper. The handwriting belonged to Bruce Wayne. He remembered the words as if he had written them yesterday;

* * *

Dear Father,

It has been too long since last I wrote.

I have travelled and I have learned. I have trained, fought and suffered.

I think I'm ready.

You once taught me that wealth and power were not privileges, they are responsibilities. I have put my faith in good men like Lucius Fox and Alfred to make sure that my fortune goes towards helping those less fortunate in my absence.

But that is not my only responsibility.

Before I write this letter I visited your grave and mothers. I remembered that the last time I visited you I left a letter much like this one. I remember that I hoped I would hear your voice inside my head telling me what to do.

But I did not. How could I?

You are dead.

Crime took you away from me.

I know that crime is just a symptom of corruption and oppression.

And so, I take a leaf from your book, Doctor Thomas Wayne.

Like a surgeon I will first combat the symptoms, then I will find the root of the problem and remove it.

I don't know if you will approve of the path that I have chosen. It is a dangerous and violent road that will probably end in my death. But if it means that nobody else will suffer what I have suffered then it is a price I pay gladly.

Soon I will strike.

I have the means, I have the methods but… I know that something is missing. I feel like I need to wait for something. I'm not sure what. A sign maybe?

Maybe I'm still that scared little boy, waiting for your voice in my head to tell me the right thing to do.

Please father. If you believe that what I am about to do is right, send me a sign.

Your loving son

Bruce

* * *

Batman folded the letter solemnly and stashed it in his belt, noticing with pleasant surprise that his it was once again fully stocked.

Pryzlak remained by the elevator door. He gestured toward the elevator.

"Shall we?" he smiled amiably "It'd be a shame for all those people to have died without you getting to see the big reveal."

Batman strode toward the elevator as Pryzlak unbuttoned his shirt, revealing the words "SILENT HILL" etched in reddish brown scabs.

"Seems like forever ago, now, right?" he smiled. The Batman grimaced.

"You'll pay for what you did to those people Pryzlak."

The two stood side by side in the elevator.

"I'm sure I will Batman."

The doors slid shut.

"I'm sure I will."


	16. Chapter 15

CHAPTER 15

The enemies stood in companionable silence as the elevator plunged down to impossible depths. The innocuous yellowing tile of the hospital quickly receded in favour of images that had no right to exist.

Things that pulsed and writhed and saw and knew.

"Ain't ya gonna ask where we're goin?" Pryzlak cracked a brown toothed smile. The Batman's eyes were once again inscrutable behind the pearlescent lenses of the cowl. He responded only with a tightening of the muscles in his jaw.

"We're going nowhere. I'm not being cute, it's actually a destination." Grinned the murderer.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

"She's close now. Real close."

Silence.

"I got a letter." Pryzlak produced a stained and dog eared sheet of paper from within the folds of his reeking overcoat. He unfolded it with obsessive care.

"My Marcie!" he crooned revealing an unfolded sheet marked with nothing more than a few nondescript yellowish stains. His eyes flicked from the paper to Batman.

"Can't see it can you?"

Silence.

"She sends them to me. Only I can see the writing. Bet you got a few too, din'cha? In fact I bet if you stared at this thing for long enough you'd see a whole other message all of your own."

There was not the slightest twitch in Batman's facial expression. The fact that he had received several such letters addressed to his murdered father in his own hand since coming to Silent Hill remained an undisclosed mystery to Jason Pryzlak.

The radio equipment in Batman's earpiece began to admit a menacing cackle that grew stronger the further the elevator descended.

"She's here!" gasped Pryzlak.

With a shudder the elevator stopped and the doors slid open admitting a wave of nauseating stench.

Burnt and rotting meat.

Batman's radio roared with static. He disconnected it.

The pair stepped out into a tiny facsimile of a hospital room, walled with the familiar rusty metal lattice of Silent Hill's 'other' side, interweaved with blood and pus stained surgical bandages. The stained greyish tiles of the hospital wards still adhered erratically to the walls in patches, as though traces of a memory that could not be unremembered.

As well as the pungent tang of blackened flesh the room was filled with a grating, rasping sound.

Ragged breathing through charred vocal cords.

In the centre of the little chamber a tenebrous, hunched figure sat in a filthy wheelchair; patchy with mould on the upholstery and scabrous with rust. Its slight frame was wrapped head to toe in yellowed bandages which were being redressed by a solemn valet whom Batman recognised instantly-

_"**Getting a pulse. Just barely breathing."**_

- The skin of the face was greyed and cracked like the bark of a dead tree

_"**Why? WHY?! What is keeping that child alive?"**_

- Twin rivulets of blood ran from the lidless eyes like tears-

_"**I can't stand it any more. Please… Help me."**_

-Its long blonde hair hung limp and lifeless. Dead grass set in baked earth skin. Those sightless eyes for one terrible moment seemed to look straight at him.

_"**Please. Help me."**_

The thing could not be Lisa Garland. Lisa Garland was dead. But this melancholy figure crafted out of pure nightmare attended to her charge as dutifully as her half remembered double might have. She… it padded around the tiny room, a lifeless zombie going through the minutia of half remembered routines.

Dabbing, cleaning, changing.

Batman's mind flitted back to his own phantom stay at Alchemilla.

Had the goodness left behind in this damned and soulless facsimile of Lisa Garland helped to bring him back from that cocoon of dreams that had dried to snuff the Batman out from within the shell of Bruce Wayne?

The thing that was not Lisa Garland left her charge alone and sobbed bloody tears into a rusted sink full of sewage coloured water.

Now The Batman faced his enemy, the twisted mind that had brought him here and tried to use the unseen forces of Silent Hill against him. The addressed the hidden face with neither fear nor pity.

"Alessa Gillespie."

Next to him the all but forgotten Pryzlak erupted in a slow hand that reverberated through the hellish antechamber. When he spoke it was the keening voice that Batman had heard him use before. The one that was not his own.

"Bravo. Bravo. You made it to the centre of my fun little maze." The voice became hushed and conspiratorial, "I always _knew_ you would. And we will have the most splendid games together, you and I." A cloud passed over Pryzlak's face as Alessa released her control of him.  
"No." The Batman snarled, snapping free a batarang and preparing to launch it in one fluid motion, "No more games!"

But before he could release the projectile something invisible reached into his brain and squeezed. He buckled to his knees and the batarang went wide of its mark and met the wall with a dull clang.

_No, Little Brucie _Alessa's voice in his head_, I have waited a LONG time to play. And I want to play NOW!_

Invisible knives stabbed into Batman's brain sending white hot pain down his spinal column and through his bones into his muscles. His stomach tore itself to writhing shreds.

_Do you know how it feels to burn, Little Brucie?_

Batman's skin erupted in an explosion of orange flame that seared through the suit's protection, clinging to his skin like oil. He writhed and crackled and smelled his own flesh.

Slowly, impossibly Alessa Gillespie, a child murdered by cultish abuse, a woman trapped in a child's spiteful revenge, rose to her feet, arms outstretched. Pryzlak, cowered, whimpering at her side as the walls sang with Batman's agony.

_They tried to put God inside me. Again and again with their needles and their pills and their stinky clothes and their breath on my neck. They hurt me and they smiled and they made me hurt inside and they said it was to put God inside me._

Batman rolled helplessly on the ground, swatting at flames that could not exist.

_Paradise, Brucie, Paradise. I used to think Paradise was beautiful and it is. It is Brucie. I got beautiful wrong. But they showed me Brucie. They showed me what real paradise is. Not many people can see it Brucie. But **you** can. I always knew you could!_

The flames vanished as soon as they had appeared. Batman lay gasping, in agony but unscarred. Pryzlak scuttled over to Alessa and threw himself at her feet.

"I did it. I brought him here. You promised. You promised you'd bring her back. You promised you'd bring back my Marcie!"

Alessa inclined her bandaged head in his direction.

_I'm bored with this one now._

Batman stirred and Pryzlak's eyes widened in horror as a foreign conscience once again forced itself into his body. It reached into his filthy trenchcoat and pulled out a bloody knife.

"No. No you promised!" Pryzlak screamed.

Pushing pain and fear aside Batman launched himself at Pryzlak.

But he was not fast enough to stop him from opening his own throat with the knife.

"NOOO!"

Batman caught the falling body, knowing instantly that there was nothing he could do.

He had wanted to see Jason Pryzlak brought to justice for the murders he had committed.

But not like this.

"Batman," he whispered, his life draining away from him, cascading in scarlet down his front, "I'm sorry. I didn't want to hurt those people. I just… I just wanted to…"

Beneath the opaque lenses of the cowl Batman shed a single tear for the poor misguided creature.

A tear for a life spent in madness and pain. A tear for the Jason Pryzlak that _might_ have been.

"I know Jason. I understand."

He lowered the body.  
"Rest now."

And as the life left Jason Pryzlak The Batman could muster no anger for him despite the hideousness of his crimes. He had been manipulated and used, taunted with the promise of a love that could never have been. Whatever Jason Pryzlak had been in life, he did not deserve this death.

The Batman rose and turned his wrath on the mummified Alessa Gillespie.

"You monster," he snarled "How could you use that sick, broken man like that? How could you make him do those horrible things just to bring me here?"

A girlish titter echoed through his skull.

"Well, now you have me, Alessa. Whatever sick games you have in mind it all ends now."

_Sick?_ The voice playfully chided. _**You're** sick. You're not well Mister Wayne. You see, you think you're a giant bat. But it's okay. I have your medicine right here._

Reality flexed and buckled. The rusty cage of the room contracted and expanded, doubling in size. A wall of tiles assembled itself in front of Batman. A single word in slick red letters daubed across the grimy surface;

**MURDERER**

_Your medicine is the truth, Little Brucie. It doesn't taste very nice but it makes you aaaalll better._

There was a buzzing, a ringing in The Batman's head. Faint but unmistakable. Like tinnitus but in the wrong place.

"I'm no murderer." He said blankly.

Again Alessa's disembodied voice giggled.

_Yes you are. Of course you are. And no, I'm not talking about that cop you let die or the boy you professed to love who died in flame and agony OR all the thousands you've killed by letting the clown live. You call me sick? We're so alike you and me, Brucie, don't you see?_

"I've had enough of this." He strode towards her, his hands clenched into fists.

_Oh my! You've quite forgotten haven't you?_

Time and space flickered and suddenly the phantom that looked like Lisa Garland was in front of him. In her hands a battered old portable television. She set it on a charred and blackened chair. The screen flickered to life despite the absence of electrical current.

Entranced Batman watched, an unknowable dread creeping into his stomach.

**A fizz of monochrome static. The image rights itself, sharpens.**

**A high angle looming over a hospital corridor.**

**Security camera footage.**

**Two doctors in frenzied debate.**

**"Doctor Stern, please."**

**"It's out of our hands, Norman."**

**"But Jesus, look at her."**

**"She's alive."**

**"You can't honestly-"**

**"This is beyond us. The child must decide wha-"**

**"Doc-, Bill, for Christ's sake he's too young to…"**

**A sigh. Resignation.**

"**Doctor Long, the Waynes were very good friends of mine. Nothing you can say can make me feel any worse about this situation."**

**A long pause. Doctor Long rubs his first two fingers together. An ex smoker's habit.**

**"What are you going to say to the kid?"**

"Turn it off." A voice speaks in Batman's head. Not his own. Or at least not the voice he recognises as his own. "It's lies. It's all lies."

**Cut.**

**A different camera.**

**Same hospital.**

**A woman lies cocooned in bandages and tubes.**

**Familiar raven tresses.**

**But there is nothing familiar about the face.**

**That poor, pulped mess, a portrait in beauty forever destroyed by a stray bullet.**

**A dainty chest rises and falls.**

**Clinging to life.**

**In another, less sombre ward a nurse is singing.**

**Her dulcet tones a lullaby to the agonised and dying.**

_"**Maybe I didn't love you… Quite as often as I could have."**_

**A tiny figure emerges into frame.**

**Chubby, pampered, weak.**

**The Batman despises him.**

_"**And maybe I didn't treat you… Quite as good as I should have."**_

**The eyes are dark smudges.**

**The camera can't see the tears.**

**A voice, somewhere else.**

**Urgent.**

"**Bill that boy is eight years old and he's grieving. How can you possibly expect him to make a decision like that?"**

**But the tiny figure has made his decision.**

**He strides toward the tortured figure on the bed with grim purpose.**

_"**If I made you feel second best… I'm so sorry. I was blind."**_

**He lays a hand on the small patch of unblemished porcelain coloured flesh of the forhead.**

**Plants a tender kiss.**

_"**You were always on my mind."**_

"**Goodbye Mother"**

**A plug is pulled.**

**The soft hum of machinery dies.**

**And so does Martha Wayne.**

_"**You were always on my mind."**_


	17. Chapter 16

CHAPTER 16

MURDERER

An instant of denial. A gag reflex. Then terrible, knowing acceptance.

MURDERER

As reality buckled and twisted and rearranged itself around him, The Batman sunk to his knees.

MURDERER

The now familiar wail of the siren seemed to ring with accusation.

MURDERER

He had seen it with his own eyes. The infant terrible nightmare prodigy of Silent Hill had ripped the memory that his mind that tried so hard to suppress from his subconscious and presented it to him red, raw and bleeding.

"I'm no murderer." He whispered.

Sheathed in layers of Kevlar and nomex he had never felt so vulnerable, once more a frightened little boy staring into the face of dark forces beyond his ken.

The world of Silent Hill, that otherside of rust and blood spun around, became a shape shifting vortex.

"I'm no murderer!" the whisper became a snarl.

Terrible laughter echoed all about him.

_If thine eye offends, little Brucie, pluck it out!_

Spoken inside his head, the words of mockery which had brought him to Silent Hill.

Only now did he comprehend their meaning.

The vortex plunged him into darkness. Deep and endless and impenetrable.

There was no ground beneath his feet, yet he was neither standing nor falling.

Far away, on the outskirts of nowhere, bits and pieces of rusted and rotted architecture danced as though blown by an impossible wind. Weightless and helpless he closed his eyes, searched deep inside himself.

_What are you looking for in there, little Brucie? Him? There is no Batman anymore. He flew away because he knows he was built on a lie._

"Damn you, Alessa. Get out of my head!"

_You were weak. That's why you needed him. A salve for your pain. You thought you could reach into the darkness and make it your own. You were blind to what you'd been searching for all along. The killer's face that greets you in the mirror._

And now she stood before him. No longer a hideously burned and bandaged crone but a young girl with ivory skin, ebony hair and eyes that pierced like rapiers. She had a pretty, but sad face. Like Eve cast forever out of Eden.

Corruption wearing the face of innocence.

They were in her world now.

She took his head in her hands and her fingertips traced the line of his jaw. Her thumbs caressed where skin met cowl. Gently, lovingly she eased the mask from Bruce Wayne's face.

_I have waited so long to taste your pain._

She put her arms around him and held him with a strength that was not that of a child. Bruce choked on tears and the stench of burning.

Batman had failed him. He had failed Batman.

_It's okay. None of that matters anymore. We will bathe in your pain together, you and I. I hate you. I love you. Everything will be okay because everything is doomed._

She kissed him on the forehead as Judas kissed Christ.

Then she burst into flame.

The flames engulfed them both, agonising flesh and soul. Bruce tried to scream but the darkness had silenced him and now there was only pain.

The pain that birthed Gods.

"No."

_Yes_.

"I don't want to burn."

_You built this fire yourself, little Brucie. You lit the flame the moment you killed her. You've been running from the fire ever since. But you can never outrun it Bruce._

"NO!"

Something inside him gave a last, weak shove. A red eye flickered into life for an instant and closed. Perhaps forever.

The fire vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

Alessa staggered backwards and fixed him with her burning eyes and there was nothing pretty or innocent about her now. The hatred and anger that twisted her face could never have been worn by a child.

_Bastard! Still you try so hard not to understand._

She reached up and grasped the darkness, pulled it down towards herself, made it liquid, a gurgling pool in the space where the ground should have been.

Now your torment shall be complete.

All about them the vortex settled, grew solid. Scattered shreds of metal gathered and hardened, forming gates, fences and there, in the distance something huge and skeletal, the shape of a spider's web.

The liquid blackness beneath them roiled and spat. A hand the colour of rotting meat grasped at freedom.

"Not him… Not now."

With a series of ominous lurches the Tormentor dragged itself into existence, its black trench coat dripping with the foul ichor of that other place. It towered over Bruce, swatting him away with a dismissive hand. Bruce tumbled in space, unable to fall to the ground for there was no ground. He tasted blood and realised with dread certainty that the will to fight had abandoned him completely.

_Anger and vengeance. The engines that drive the Batman. How useless they are to you now Bruce._

The Tormentor lumbered towards him, the oozing muzzle of its gun hand trained on his back. He tried to rise but the darkness held him fast. The rusted and rotten matter of Silent Hill had created an arena around him, a featureless cage that would deliver him to death.

Wait!

The Tormentor halted, lowered its weapon. Alessa floated to Bruce's hunched and beaten form.

_You wouldn't let me down like this would you Brucie? You wouldn't give me a taste of pain to whet my appetite then embrace death like one of them?! Oh my love, my enemy, I am drunk on your pain. You cannot take it away from me now._

She reached up and rested a hand on his bowed head. Bruce cried out as the hand shifted through flesh and skull and brain, reached into his mind and rummaged. A little girl searching for treats-

* * *

Flash! Boom. Daddy is Dead.

Click. Beeeeeeeeeeeep. Mommy is Dead.

_Yes, yes, yes, but loss on its own is meaningless._

_You know this. Deep down._

_Pain tastes best alongside sweeter meats._

-why do we fall, Bruce?"

Strong arms and daylight and the sting of antiseptic. The sweet aroma of mother's perfume, the scratch of father's moustache.

"So that we can learn to pick ourselves up."

Thomas and Martha Wayne in the ballroom of Wayne Manor, Alfred stands dutifully by the record player. Strauss' Blue Danube waltz echoes through the cavernous room and brings joy to its austere walls. The two lovers glide and whirl like leaves tossed by a summer breeze, little Bruce, an arm around each neck giggles with the unfettered glee of childhood.

_Yesssss. There can be no true pain without love!_

-"If they loved me then they'd let me do what I want!"

Seven year old Bruce throws himself into the soft down of his quilt, hot tears stinging his face.

"And it is precisely because they love you that they have not let you do what you want, young Master Bruce."

Alfred sits beside Bruce. The smells of chai tea and lavender.

"History is riddled with stories of wealthy men far too accustomed to getting what they want. Not one of them ends well. Your mother and father wish only to teach you temperance, young sir."

Tears are wiped away by a velvet glove.

"Indulgence may have brought you happiness for the moment, Master Bruce. But in the end, indulgence breeds restlessness and anger."

Gently but firmly, Alfred lifts little Bruce up and holds him by the shoulders, his piercing green eyes fixed on the boy's.

"It is love, Master Bruce, that builds better men."-

…Wait? What are you doing?

-"We love this city, Bruce. Your mother and I." Thomas Wayne does not need to shout for his voice to be heard even above the sound of the wind and the roar of the city below. "Your grandfather, Alan Wayne helped to build the structures that make this city what it is, including the tower we're standing on."

Little Brucie looks down at the streets below and feels like a God.

"The people look so tiny from up here!" he yells.

"And that's exactly why we mustn't spend too much time up here. Those little specks down there are husbands and fathers, wives and mothers, sisters and brothers, boyfriends and girl friends and best friends. If we're to love the city we have to love the people. That's what your grandfather did, that's what I try to do. That's the purpose of the Wayne foundation."

"But you can't love all these people, Dad. Not like you love Mom. Not like you love me!"

Little Brucie shivers as the wind bites at his limbs. Thomas Wayne wraps him up in the folds of his overcoat.

"True. But there are many different forms of love, Bruce. That's why it's important to spend as much time down there as up here. From up here we're in a position to help the people down there, but we cannot, for a second think we're above them."-

* * *

_Why are you smiling?_

"Thank you Alessa. You've finally made me understand what it takes to survive Silent Hill."

Back in that amorphous nowhere Bruce smiled. The red eye inside flicked open and burned with a stronger light. A light that can never be extinguished.

"I am not vengeance. I never was. I am the reason why the just should never fear the dark."

He stands, a colossus, drawling the sightless substance of Silent Hill around him like a cloak. He strides toward Alessa who floats away in curious retreat. The Tormentor blocks his path.

"You poor, poor creature Alessa. I saw inside your mind, just as you saw inside mine. I saw what they did to you. The Order, your mother. They thought that the only way to birth their God was through pain."

_Shut up._

The Tormentor levelled its gun at Bruce and as he stepped forward he kicked out and sent the nightmare creature sprawling backward. Its form rippled and shifted.

"I suppose they were right in a way. In your pain you reached out with the parts of your mind they were afraid of. Like a stone dropped in waves. You reached out to these forces but you don't control them. Not really."

The Tormentor writhed in nothingness; it threw off its trench coat to reveal a slender, greyish body. Its hands were fingerless and there was a twisted, bustling mass of flesh where its face should have been. He stood over it and looked down with curiosity and pity.

"Your order had a name for these Gods. So did the Native American tribes that lived here centuries ago. They felt your pain and tried to shape their world accordingly. Is this what your Order thought was paradise?"

_That's enough!_

"How old were you when you realised you could make people see things that weren't there? What did you twist these things into?"

Alessa screamed. A spoilt brat failed by her toys. Reality quaked around them, reconfigured.

"When pain became your entire life you reached out with your mind and tried to taste the pain of others. Silent Hill is a resort town. A lot of people come and go. A lot of people with their own private nightmares. What did you show James Sunderland, Alessa? What did you show Jason Pryzlak?"

_You think you know about pain Little Brucie? I will make you yearn for something as sweet as what you call pain!_

In the distance there was the sound of the fairground. The laughter of a clown. Rusted iron and rotted timber formed themselves into rides and games, a grotesque parody of an amusement park.

"Pryzlak came to Silent Hill from Gotham. You reached into his head and caught a glimpse of me, didn't you?"

Fire flashed in Alessa's eyes and she raised a hand, the fingers twisted and clenched. Things the colour of rotted meat slithered wetly into being, sprouted limbs and learned to stand. Their heads twitched frenziedly.

"You thought that a Batman could only be born of a pain like yours and you taunted him with lies and visions until he brought that pain to you."

With a huge convulsion the Tormentor threw itself back to its feet. The pulpy mass of its face opened into a bleeding, brown toothed grin. Green hair the colour of rotted cabbage sprouted on its head.

_And now you are here to disappoint me in the flesh. But I have looked inside your mind, Little Brucie and seen what you fear the most._

All around him the demented carnival of Silent Hill roared to life. Fairground music played over screams of agony. In a wooden booth adorned with flaking red paint one of the laughing creatures gleefully beat a young boy half to death with a crowbar. Crimson blood spattered on a yellow cape. Amorphous figures clapped their fingerless hands together in wet applause. Elsewhere a small creature giggled with mirth as it fired round after round into twitching, wretched facsimiles of Thomas and Martha Wayne. A flaming cart trundled noisily across a rollercoaster track, full of thrashing limbs and cries of pain.

Cacophonous laughter thickened the air.

_Look around, Little Brucie. This is the world stripped bare and shown for what it is. A carnival of chaos where the damned rut and hurt and murder each other. And you try to bring order to this. You are pathetic!_

The smile vanished from Bruce's face. His eyes and jaw hardened and he drew the mask back down over his face.

A Batman reborn.

"Poor Alessa. You never understood what Batman is. It's okay. For a while I didn't either. Let me show you!"

The Tormentor launched itself at him with a roar of familiar laughter. Batman twisted and rolled, throwing his attacker into the either and launching himself back to his feet.

"Fine. The hard way it is!"

Two of the smaller grinning creatures leapt at him, he intercepted them both, slashing at the face of one with his gauntlet while bringing his elbow down hard on the other.

Something cracked and made a wet, tearing sound.

The Batman held nothing back. These things were not human or even living. Not really.

He whirled around to face Alessa. She floated in the dark ether. There was hatred in here eyes but also a frustration that was strikingly child like.

The Tormentor leapt upon Batman's back, something jagged and metallic ripped through the skin of its arm and came to rest in its hand.

A rusted crowbar.

The creature set it across Batman's throat and yanked at it hard. Seizing their opportunity the smaller creatures dived upon their prey, their rictus grins sprouting brown fangs. They were soon upon him, a slithering mass of biting fangs and clawing hands. Alessa giggled with grotesque joy and twirled around with her arms outstretched. But her victory was short lived. The pile of bodies exploded outwards, squealing wretched things sailed through the ether clawing at nothing. Their claws were blunted. Their teeth were broken.

The Batman's cape was no longer a cape but billowing wings. They blocked attacks and scythed through attackers.

Alessa's panicked eyes searched for the Tormentor. It was nowhere to be seen.

She grit her teeth, strained her mind. Twisted, grotesque shapes shuddered and writhed themselves into being but were swatted aside in a flurry of cape and gauntlet and boot and fist.

The Batman was not even out of breath.

_Why? Why can't I break you?_

He stalked towards her, fists clenched, teeth clamped together, his white eyes lenses burning with fury and for the first time since she was the child she appeared to be Alessa Gillespie knew fear.

I just wanted…

She sagged and slid slowly to the ground.

Her body aged and burned.

_I just wanted to love you Bruce._

She fell.

And the nightmare reality she had created fell with her.

The world twitched, convulsed and was suddenly in freefall.


	18. Chapter 17

CHAPTER 17

Alessa Gillespie died that night.

She died in the Martha Wayne Memorial Ward of Gotham General Hospital.

And Bruce Wayne had held her hand as her last breath left her.

And as he walked alone down the hospital corridor.

Amidst the smell of blood, faeces and chemical disinfectant Bruce allowed himself to cry.

He cried for the enemies who might have been friends and the dead who might have lived.

And as he searched for his handkerchief his hand settled upon a sheet of paper that had not been there before.

And this is how it read.

* * *

Dear Mother and Father,

This will be my last letter.

I miss you more than words can say but for the first time in my life I feel that my pain is salved by the knowledge that I'm doing the right thing.

I have come to realise something.

One day you will start to fade from my memory.

One day I will have to try to make sense of a world without you.

And before that happens I need to make a promise to you. A promise to myself.

I need to ensure that I let my actions be guided by your love, by the power of your memory and not by the abyss of grief and rage left by your passing.

Crime took you from me.

On that night I made a promise. A promise to rid this city of the evil that took your lives. But that was a promise built on anger and fear, and I now know that a real promise, a binding promise can only be built on love.

And so tonight I leave you with that same promise.

I will rid this city of the evil that took your lives but I will do it with love, not vengeance as my guide.

You told me that Waynes helped to build this city and make it what it is.

As a Wayne I will continue to uphold that tradition.

As Bruce Wayne I can build and repair, I can create jobs and spread wealth.

But there will always be places where my influence can't reach, and crime will grow there if unchecked, like a weed.

And I can't stop that as Bruce Wayne.

And so I have become a symbol. I have taken that thing which I fear the most and embraced it. I will be a symbol to strike fear into the hearts of those who do evil, yes, but also a symbol to inspire good in the people of Gotham.

I hope that I will make you proud.

Your loving son,

Batman


	19. Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Greg Adams was a good kid. He went to church, never swore out loud, helped doors open for people walking behind him and always went out of his way to thank the doctors and nurses who took him back from the brink of death and brought him, slowly but surely back to full health.

He'd probably never play football again, but he'd live.

As he left hospital he made sure to shake each of the doctors and nurses that had treated him by the hand. The men clapped him on the back, smiles and best wishes. The women made a fuss and cooed over him and told him how handsome he was.

Vikki had rushed into his arms, tears and smiles. She offered to take him home. Greg kissed her gently and then politely declined.

There was something he had to do.

And with that Greg Adams took his first laboured steps back into Gotham's embrace.

The first few weeks had been tough. He'd jumped at slamming doors and backfiring cars. Raised voices made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

But he refused to be beaten.

So he walked the streets of Gotham at night.

Alone.

When he was absolutely sure his parents were asleep he snuck out of the apartment and walked Gotham's grimy walkways.

Metropolis may be the city of tomorrow but it was a city that was best seen in the daytime, all steel and glass and reflective surfaces that seemed made just to reflect a beautiful sunrise.

But Gotham?  
Gotham came alive at night. The neo-gothic architecture wore shadows, neon and streetlights as its jewellery and the city paraded itself in her finery.

Greg hung out outside the jazz clubs, letting the wash of music and conversation flow over him every time the door opened.

He killed time at the late night coffee shops where they read poetry and sang the blues.

He ate ice cream in the diners where the matronly waitresses made a fuss out of him and asked him what a good looking boy like him was doing out at night unaccompanied.

Those early sojourns had been a nightmare.

Every shadow, every darkened alley, nook and crevice seemed to conceal hidden threats. Danger lurked within the unknown. Fear seemed built into the mortar of the city. Every step seemed to bring fresh pain, a callous reminder of his wounds.

But days became weeks and the pain subsided. Greg walked long into the night. The city he loved had betrayed him, injured him but he was willing to forgive it. As he strode through her lamp lit streets he and Gotham slowly rebuilt their relationship like reunited lovers separated by time and pain.

Vikki moved away. This is not **that** sort of happy ending. As much as they loved Greg her parents also saw his stabbing as the final straw.

But that was another love that Greg Adams was not prepared to abandon.

He called, he wrote, they managed.

Love finds a way.

Weeks became months and once again Greg moved through the streets of Gotham as easily and purposefully as a blood cell navigates a vein. He shot the breeze with street musicians, spared change where he could and every night looked up now and then at the gargoyles that watched over him hundreds of feet above. Hoping to see one of them move.

It was three months after the incident when Greg finally plucked up the courage to return to the archway at the entrance of the first national bank. The sidewalk where he had bled had been washed clean by rain and the passing of thousands of pairs of feet.

A clean slate.

Greg leaned on the cool stone buttress and turned his face up to the sky.

"I never got the chance to say thank you."

A voice whispered from the darkness,

"And you'll never have to."


	20. Afterword

_"A lullaby to close your eyes"_

Afterword

by

Dan Laurikietis

I don't like hospitals.

Not one bit.

It's the smell.

That smell of blood and faeces masked with disinfectant and bad food.

It's an unfortunate consequence of having a self destructive alcoholic parent that one spends a great deal of time breathing it. When I begun writing this in 2006 it was shortly after visiting my mother in one of those necessary but loathsome institutions. They told me that she would probably never leave.

She proved them wrong that time.

And the time after that.

The third time she wasn't so lucky.

By the time I held my mother's hand as she breathed her last in 2008 I had already begun using this story as an outlet for dealing with her slow death but it was only then that I decided that the climax had to take place in a hospital.

If Bruce Wayne were real I bet he'd hate hospitals too. What greater insult for a man who has dedicated his life to fighting misery, pain and death than to surround him with it?

Which brings us to that delightful resort town of Silent Hill.

That place which looks through your false smiles and practiced confidence and sees what you fear the most before ripping it out of you and laying it bare before you.

Who better to demonstrate this than the Batman? I mean who else carries round that sort of emotional baggage? If Clark Kent went to Silent Hill he'd probably have a perfectly pleasant weekend and leave with nothing less innocuous than postcards and hotel stationary. But Bruce? Silent Hill would have a field day.

In fact, I'm amazed that nobody else thought to do a Batman / Silent Hill crossover. It's just so blindingly obvious! So I set the twon loose on Batman and before my very eyes it assaulted him with his most grievous failures (the death of Jason Todd, the creation of Two Face) and ripped the psychological armour that Batman represented for Bruce just as it relieved him, part by part, of the bat suit.

But there's a reason why Silent Hill 2 has the best ending.

Silent Hill works best when its protagonist has some dark secret lodged deep inside, hidden even from themselves and hence the twist at the end.

While the notion of Thomas and Martha Wayne dying instantly before they hit the dirt of Crime Alley is a romantic one it is also absurdly unrealistic.

What if Martha Wayne didn't die straight away? What if little Bruce had to undergo the agony and trauma of watching her slowly fade in a hospital facing the choice between a life of agony or the release of death?

It's a no-brainer but one that Bruce would never forgive himself for.

Maybe that's why he throws himself in front of knives and bullets every night, maybe it's his penance as much as his duty. An attempt to exorcise an unnameable demon inside himself. Perhaps the spirits or forces or whatever is behind Silent Hill is trying to show Bruce what his subconscious tries so hard to keep from him?

That line about how the monsters are actually angels? Yeah, I stole that from Jacob's Ladder (which Team Silent have sited as a major influence on the Silent Hill series) but it's been my guiding principal. And yes, The Tormentor is Pyramid Head... Or at least the force that James Sunderland sees as Pyramid Head.

In realising the truth Bruce discovers that Batman is not an agent of vengeance but an agents of love. Love for his city, love for the people and love for the memory of his parents. I like to think that the Batman that whispers his friendly vow to young Greg Adams is a much more content and well adjusted one than the Batman who first rescued him from Jason Pryzlak.

I hope you have enjoyed this story, dear reader. It certainly has been a long time coming and even as I type I find it hard to believe that it is finally complete. It's taken me over six years. In that time I've gone from an easy but pointless office job to journalism to acting and now to teaching. I have got engaged and then married. I bought a house. I've gone from being an insecure angst riddled twentysomething to an insecure angst riddled thirtysomething.

I want to thank, from the bottom of my heart, all the people who have stuck with this story and lent it their gracious support, reviews and feedback.

That means you, Tenro100, Soviet Inclination (wherever you may be), Maiafay (although I maintain that 'full-pelt' is a legitimate phrase), Cyanotique, Konig15, Dthomasjr87 and finally RJ the Clown who I feel has been my biggest champion since pretty much the beginning.

Whether you're one of this story's long-time supporters (it's be terribly self-aggrandising to call you fans) or if you're reading this for the first time all in one go then I thank you once again for reading this story and this little blurb and hope you will take the time to get in touch with a review, feedback or criticism.


End file.
